RE Equipment Standards and Ratings [RE-wrenches]

[john at gosolar.co.nz]

Hi all,

Er, what about the international community - there is life outside the U.S. as
well. Any standards for consideration have to be international in scope.  That adds
another dimension to the equation.

                            regards,                John V

------------------------------------------------------------------------

John Raynes wrote:

> At 06:46 PM 4/18/02 -0700, you wrote:
>
> >YOU FOLKS ARE DEVELOPING THE STANDARDS, AND ARE THE DE-FACTO RATING
> >ORGANIZATION!
>
> Hi Richard,
>
> In the end, there still needs to be standard procedures, adopted on an
> industry-wide basis, that serve as the guidelines for doing the testing and
> reporting the results, as Bill states so well.  That's not disagreeing with
> what you're saying, as I'll explain.
>
> The discussion going on here is EXACTLY the type of discussion that goes on
> in every standards writing process, in every industry I ever worked
> in.  It's lively, contentious, even heated at times, but at the end of the
> day, what usually emerges is a consensus.  The thing that seems to be
> missing here is a national professional/trade organization that is formally
> guiding the process toward a widely understood and agreed-upon
> goal.  Without that, we all just get frustrated.
>
> I'm not talking about nebulous 3rd parties, and I'm not talking at all
> about testing agencies.  I'm talking about standards writing, by itself,
> pure and simple.  Within every maturing industry, there always winds up
> being at least one organization, made up of trade professionals like this
> group, that takes on the mission of writing, publishing and promoting
> performance standards for that industry.  In our case, it's not obvious
> what organization that will be, although we do know who's been doing the
> good work to date, the work that will form the basis of the standards that
> emerge.  To Bill and all the others, thanks, and keep up the good fight.
>
> An effective standards-writing organization will be national in scope, it
> must be willing to take on the job, and it must have or earn the necessary
> credibility, so that the standards it produces will be widely
> recognized.  The last point is very important, because often the
> manufacturers have to be dragged to the table kicking and screaming.  I
> don't think that's the case here, but once a formal process picks up a head
> of steam, you never know.
>
> Sandia?  No, it's not their mission to write standards for private
> industry, I don't think, but they and NREL would be a major contributors.
>
> UL/NEC?  No, they're mission is public safety.  Performance standards are
> outside their scope.
>
> IEEE?  Maybe, if they (and we) are interested.  They certainly have the
> credibility, and this would be well within the scope of their
> standard-writing activities.  If the wrenches don't take this bull by the
> horns, the utilities eventually will in a few years time, and IEEE is the
> likely place where they would go anyway, so it merits consideration.
>
> ASES?  I'd like to see it start there, because they have our interests most
> at heart.  Are they interested, and can they marshal the resources?
>
> Any other suggestions?
>
> A well written standard covers not only methods, but deals with ALL the
> endless details of test configurations (where to locate the shunts, where
> to connect the meter leads, how accurate the meters must be, etc, etc,
> etc).  Also, the exact formulas for computing every specified result.
>
> Once you have the standards, you don't need the ETLs and Sandias to conduct
> the tests, in order for them to have weight.  Any third party with the
> right equipment can conduct them.  There may still be disputes about
> whether the tests were performed correctly, but not about the tests themselves.
>
> Am I missing something?  Who are we looking to, to take the PV system
> performance standards job, and run with it?  And where should it end up?
>
> Regards,
> John Raynes
> RE Solar
> Sandy UT
>
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