Balcony solar is all the rage in Germany. Why not in the US?

It's a normal outlet, and the power is limited to 800 watts. Batteries are entirely optional. The energy that gets used gets used, and what's left is fed upstream into the power network. Some people here don't have new energy meters but those old ferraris meters, and they actually may count backwards, so that's nice, too.

It's a regular German outlet, but they would be more comparable to a drier outlet here in the US, although without being rated for such high loads as an american clothes drier.

As another commenter said, They're used to cover the base load of lights, fridge, small electronics. Most all of these systems won't have any battery storage so the power either gets used in the moment by the home, or exported to the utility. That part isnt really any different from a typical solar installation in the US. They're just smaller systems so it's more accessible to lower income people and people that live in apartments.

Actually it's quite smart and simple l: you take any outlet in your house!

The ac/dc transformer those things simply feeds it's energy into your house - after all a plug doesn't care in which direction power flows. .those systems have an upper cap though to prevent people from overloading the net.

It's really neat and simple! You basically lower your lower consumption by whatever these things produce.

I don't know or have seen anyone using these small balcony cells with a battery though - while technically not a problem I think there's simply not a use case: they don't overproduce that much at any given time anyway.

The pv panel just provides the electricity to your house. Essentially, if it provides electricity, your devices use that before using the grid. If it provides excess electricity beyond what you use, it feeds back into the grid. There's nothing to it, just plug it in. Just remember that if you disconnect a circuit to work on it, you may also have to disconnect your panels because the wires may still be "hot" (they shouldn't because the PV usually stops providing electricity once it loses the grid frequency, but better safe than sorry).

I know the hogs are making us look so bad that we might never recover; but please keep in mind that we don’t fucking ALL want that. I’d be willing to bet not even a majority.

We are, however, asleep at the wheel, held hostage by our financial and employment situation, or both

Uh, you are aware that your laptop charger is providing DC right?

It is being sent into the general electrical network of the house/flat, where it lightens the base load. There is a maximum of 800W that you are allowed to feed into your home network. Anything bigger is subject to different rules and approval by the electrical service provider.

800W aren't a lot, but it can half the cost of your washing machine run, make your fridge power free and let a PC idel or a NAS run. These balcony solar generators usually make back their costs within 5-8 years if you calculate what you'd otherwise pay for the electricuty.

Im setting this up right now on my balcony, which will make me the third apartment in my building to install a system like this.

All you need is some standard solar panels (they all use the same connectors so you can mix between brands often) and an inverter box.

I got three used panels for 10€ a piece a few months ago which i will slap on the outside of the balcony.

This 800W grid synchronizing inverter can be had for 100€ currently and even has two MPPT trackers for separate panel strings (for when not all panels are oriented in the same direction).

This is what the end result typically looks like:

These setups come with a fitting transformer and you feed their generated power directly in your home power lines via normal plug. It's quite neat actually in my opinion!

Then you were really unlucky. While I don't have one myself, I see them a lot in Germany in all kinds of cities and also villages.

There are several dozen on my block alone in Munich. Including the one on my house.