The ConnectDER mounts behind an electric meter to make a simple, low-cost connection point for home solar power. It is a safe and convenient way to connect solar PV to a customer’s premises; most, if not all, of the connection can be performed on the exterior of the home.

 

In a June 2015 article “Gizmo Cuts Cost of Grid Interconnection for Rooftop Solar “ , William Pentland, a contributor at Forbes explains more about the problem being solved.

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“The cost of interconnecting with the electric grid is a significant barrier to customer adoption of distributed generation technologies like rooftop solar. The barrier is especially severe in the residential sector …. One of the more common and more significant of these additional costs takes the form of upgrading a home’s distribution panel, … [which] are frequently too small to handle the total energy output of a solar power system.  …  A panel upgrade typically costs between $1,500 and $3,000.

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Even if the panel does not need to be upgraded, the panel may still create additional costs for a project. Distribution panels are often located in basements, attics or other parts of a house that are more difficult to access. You may need to drill, run long wires and so forth to integrate a rooftop solar system with the home’s electrical system through the panel.

[The ConnectDER] arrangement effectively bypasses the distribution panel altogether and instead wires the onsite power system directly into the meter.  ….The result: lower costs and fewer headaches.”

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The ConnectDER enables rapid connection of grid-ready distributed energy resources (DERs), especially solar photovoltaic systems, by creating a connection point to a collar that installs between a residential electric meter and a meter socket.  It drives a number of benefits for the installation process:

• Reduces costs by removing some balance of system components and premises wiring upgrades

• Minimizes logistics headaches & site inspection time

• Eliminates one of the primary areas of inspection failures, the load-side wiring

It comes in two versions: the SIMPLE ConnectDER, which provides the basic connection, and the SMART ConnectDER, which adds metering and management functions for the local utility.