But how do you know how much you'd have produced without power optimizers?
How do you even estimate return of investment for the power optimizers?
Are you sure you wouldn't be producing more if you had put the same money in getting more panels? (Of course, sometimes you are area constrained and then it may make more sense to optimize the available area for most production possible; but I still kind of assume by default that solar installations are constrained by cost.)
The optimizers are 50 EUR each
Panels are 126 EUR, plus another 50-60 installation and mounting.
The inverter 3.5KW 845 EUR
Total system was 5K EUR, I can get back about 800 EUR tax. ROI of 6-7 years, probably more as they plan to change the feed in tariff in a few years.
A 3.5 KW SMA inverter is 1100 EUR, so I could've bough maybe 1 extra panel for the same EUR amount with traditional string inverters. I could've fit maybe another 4 panels on the roof, but this would cover my needs already, and they would be in an even less ideal places.
Partial shading can be tricky, but here is an example:
I usually simplify it that the string will produce the same % of power as the weakest link.
The optimizers are a relatively small amount of the total cost, are they not?
As far as cost vs space issues, many times it isn't a simple calculation--you may have a certain amount of space where the installation cost will be low, but to increase the size may require a disproportionate additional investment for a variety of reasons. In my case I'm not 'out of space' but any significant increase in the area of my system would come at greatly increased cost. I'd be better off updating my existing panels. I'm sure the NL is generally more space constrained than I am. My roof is 450m2.
Yes, basically it is 10% of the full system+installation cost. And as I mentioned, it makes the inverter cheaper, so its not even that clear cut.
Of course if ROI is the only deciding factor, then there are Chinese inverters for half the price, and cheaper panels.
Did you read the bit about SolarEdge optimizers causing interference on the C2000 network? The Germans mentioned that an EU country has started a procedure to block sales of P300, P370, P600, P600-M27 ... but maybe that's just the ones they tested up to now. Got a bunch of P505's here.
If they have to go fix every installation with SolarEdge optimizers that's going to cost a god awful amount of money to fix, installers would just go into bankruptcy instead of paying for that.
PS. here in the Netherlands people will generally be space restricted.
I didn't hear about it. Maybe I will poke around with an E field probe and see if it picks up anything?