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Puerto Rico, an island with the population of over 3.6 million people
faced its worst nightmare in September of 2017: Hurricane Maria.
A category 5 hurricane so devastating that it left more than a million homes
without electricity for several months.
Many houses did have solar on their roofs and yet they were left in the dark without electricity.
Confused? Let me explain. Grid-tied solar systems that constitute more than 98%
of the residential solar systems worldwide cannot generate electricity when the grid goes down.
The inverters present in the solar systems are not capable of forming their own grid.
Puerto Rico's darkness in spite of solar cannot be treated as an isolated case.
This has happened in Australia, United States, Germany, India, China, UK,
Haiti, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, Chile, Philippines, Mozambique and many other places.
And the cause might be typhoons, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, earthquakes, landslides,
ice storms, volcanic eruptions, and even wildfires.
With the growing number of natural disasters, power outages are becoming more frequent.
The hybrid and off-grid solar systems are way too expensive
and come with their own set of limitations.
Enphase's Ensemble technology can solve this problem.
Ensemble can provide electricity to your home by harnessing the solar energy
whether the grid is present or not.
Enphase's eighth-generation microinverter, the IQ8, is the foundation of the Ensemble technology.
The IQ8 is the power conditioning unit that converts the DC power generated from the solar panels
to AC power, the form of electricity that runs your homes.
The IQ8 microinverter, which is capable of forming its own grid,
in conjunction with the Envoy Combiner, the Enpower Switch, the Encharge Battery,
and the Enlighten cloud make up Ensemble.
When connected to the grid, the Enphase system works as a traditional grid-tied system,
but in the event of a grid failure, Enpower senses the outage
and isolates the Enphase system away from the grid connection.
The IQ8, however, continues to harvest solar energy by transitioning into grid forming inverter mode.
All this happens autonomously, in the blink of an eye.
When the grid comes back several hours or days later,
Enpower senses the grid and reconnects the system back to it.
The IQ8 then transitions back to traditional grid-side mode.
Solar energy harvesting remains uninterrupted.
This unique capability is what makes Ensemble the first truly grid-agnostic technology.
Encharge, Enphase's new modular AC-coupled battery storage system,
brings you closer to energy independence.
The grid-forming IQ8 microinverters and a battery management system present within
makes Encharge a smart device that can support backup operation,
enabling you to store the excess solar energy that could be used later at a time the sun isn't shining.
If you already have Enphase's IQ7 or IQ6 microinverters on your roof,
just add Encharge and Enpower to your system and enjoy the benefits of Ensemble,
the grid-forming IQ8 microinverters within Encharge will ensure your energy independence.
In the Ensemble suite, Encharge will be introduced first.
The Ensemble Combiner, with an integrated cellular module,
connects the system to the Enlighten cloud facilitating remote monitoring and troubleshooting.
The Enlighten monitoring system gives access to and allows you to control your Ensemble.
Energy produced, consumed, and stored can all be viewed on your mobile phone in real time.
You can turn the loads on or off, disable power export to the grid,
and control when you want to charge and discharge the batteries.
Enlighten even tells you how long your Encharge will last in case of a power outage.
To make things cool, Ensemble has been integrated with your virtual assistants.
- Alexa, how long will the Encharge last? - Seven hours.
- Alexa how much solar energy has been produced today? - 13 kilowatt hour.
Isn't it cool?
It took 10 years of innovation, 330-plus patents,
eight generations of microinverters, and five generations of ASICs
to make Ensemble a reality.
Ensemble, with the IQ8 microinverters within Encharge or on the roof,
makes you grid agnostic.
Needless to say, Ensemble is your solar insurance,
the always-on energy solution.
Enphase, your energy, your choice, always on.