It is now legal to buy and use plug-in solar panels in the UK, but safety concerns surrounding them haven’t yet been addressed by the UK government. This is according to one of the leading engineering institutions, which says the legalisation has been rushed through without creating proper legal standards and has created an increased risk to life. With plug-in solar panels, you simply buy a kit, place it in a sunny spot and plug it into a wall socket.
There’s no installation cost, no certification and no planning permission. The devices are popular in many European countries and the UK government legalised them on 27 August to boost renewable energy generation and cut down on household bills. Prior to this legalisation, Mark Coles, the head of technical regulations at the UK Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), told New Scientist about several potential issues.
One surrounded residual current devices (RCDs), the safety devices found in fuse boxes that sense when current is leaking to ground – a sign of electrocution or a short circuit – and almost instantaneously cut power. Most RCDs used in the UK aren’t suitable for current flowing in both directions and so could malfunction if used with plug-in solar panels. Another of the IET’s concerns is what happens if there are multiple kits in use and a power cut occurs.
In theory, the plug-in kits should also shut down in order to prevent “islanding”, when one home’s power stays live. But if they are still generating power, then they could deceive each other into thinking the grid is live and keep running. The problem then is that power can jump past the fuse box and electrocute maintenance workers in the area fixing the outage.
The IET made these concerns clear to the UK government both before and during the consultation by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) that ended on 30 June. But Coles says the issues weren’t addressed and now present a risk. There needed to be time to develop a proper standard for these things, because we feel under certain circumstances that there’s an increased risk to life.” Plug-in solar is coming – how dangerous is it and is it worth it?
Coles says the risks emerge only when there’s a perfect storm of problems, but that this will inevitably lead to an injury or a death over time if plug-in solar panels are widely adopted. Extensive scientific studies have been carried out to determine how quickly damage is done within the human body from electric shock. Based on that research, UK RCDs are required to trip and cut off current within 40 milliseconds.
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