Two pieces of paperwork follow a solar installation in South Africa. One is about electrical safety and applies to every system. The other is about connecting to the grid and applies to most hybrid and grid-tied systems. Here is what each involves.
The Certificate of Compliance
Under the Electrical Installation Regulations, 2009, any change to an electrical installation must be tested and certified by a registered person. For a solar or backup system, that means a Certificate of Compliance (CoC) issued by a registered electrical contractor once the installation is complete.
Keep it with your house documents. Insurers can ask for it after a claim, and you will need a valid CoC when you sell the property.
Small-scale embedded generation (SSEG)
If a system is connected to the grid, your supplier needs to approve it. Most municipalities call this small-scale embedded generation, or SSEG. The application is made to whoever supplies your meter: the City of Tshwane, City Power, Ekurhuleni or Eskom. The suburb name does not always tell you which, so check a recent bill.
Hybrid inverters count as grid-connected in most cases, even if you only use the power yourself, because they are wired to the municipal supply.
What the application usually needs
- The supply account details and the owner's consent
- A single-line diagram of the system and its connection point
- The inverter's NRS 097-2-1 grid-connection certificate, for the exact model installed
- Equipment specifications for the panels, inverter and battery
- The installer's details and, once installed, the Certificate of Compliance
Exporting power to the grid
Feeding power back into the grid needs specific approval and a bidirectional meter. In Tshwane, export credits are set in the city's annual tariff schedule, which changes every July. Until your supplier approves export, your inverter should be set to zero export.
Processing times vary between suppliers and sometimes between applications. We submit the forms and follow up, and tell you where things stand.
Checklists change
Municipal requirements are updated from time to time. We confirm the current checklist with your supplier before every application rather than relying on last year's forms.
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