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Comment by MountDoom | Hacker News Reader

> * Fire insurance or well, potential no-payout if your installation creates a fire.

This is pretty much a myth. Insurance pays out even if you cause a hazard, as long as it's not intentional (i.e., not insurance fraud). Talk to any insurance adjuster: undisclosed DIY is not enough to deny a claim.

What happens instead is that if you make a claim and the damage is due to stuff you didn't tell the insurer about, they will drop you right after they pay. Another possibility is that if they do any proactive inspections (e.g., drone fly-bys), they can decline to insure you or drop your policy.

A more substantial problem is that this page sort of oversells what they're pitching. 1.2 kW of solar power is a fraction of typical household usage. 2.4 kWh battery storage also isn't a whole lot. And yeah, it's cheaper than paying someone, but if your roof starts leaking, it's gonna cost you and you have no one to sue.

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> 1.2 kW of solar power is a fraction of typical household usage.

Yes and no; it really depends on what kind of house you have, how many people live there, and (culturally?) where you live.

I have an 1800 sqft condo in San Francisco, and a 3.6-4.0kW solar system would be what I'd end up installing if I were to do it the "normal" route with an installer and all the "red tape". Yes, that's obviously 3+ times the 1.2kW demonstrated here, but even a system like that would be useful for me to reduce my electricity costs (especially given where I live).

I know people with more modest electricity needs than I have. I also know people who have 16kW of solar on their roof and that still isn't enough to avoid pulling power from the grid sometimes. So: yes and no; it depends.

I never planned & priced out battery storage, but, sure, 2.4kWh would be pretty low for my needs, but it would still be useful.

It's just weird that the article title includes the phrase "energy independence", when the author admits that they still pull more than half their usage from the grid.

my wife and I managed to get to an average load of 100 Watts (2.4 kwh per day) for months at a time when we lived in San Diego, albeit with no a/c and gas heating/cooking/hot water. Modern appliances generally don't need much.

Fire is one thing, if someone gets toasted the wrongful death lawsuit is going to be out of control.

> as long as it's not intentional

I think this could be considered intentional, because in most countries, connecting this inverter to anything (source, sink) would require certification (+tests), as it doesn't have standard electrical outlets (it varies from country to country, but in the countries I've seen, either certification is required or connecting wall/ceiling lamps is exempted from this, but verification must be done afterward).

It's a code violation, not insurance fraud.

I read about this often whenever I'm looking at guidance for one of my hobbies, and often people are dealing with it in their garage. Some jurisdictions are more okay with DIYing than others, but it's all too common that someone is taking 240V, 30A and going to an enclosure that they built to get 3+ HP/2+ kW at 240 or 480V, three phase.

The common refrain is that your insurance will deny your claim.

The response that people get when they call their insurance is "you pay us to cover you even when you do the wrong thing". Just like how your auto insurance covers you when you rear-end someone while drunk as hell, when you drape way too many lights on your crispy dead Christmas tree, or when you fall asleep and light your drapes on fire with a cigarette.

Intent is when you set out to cause an accident.

(You should probably read your actual insurance policies before considering my not-a-lawyer American-centric comments.)

> It's a code violation, not insurance fraud.

I think nobody mentioned about insurance fraud. There is a difference between a accidental mistake, not knowing what your doing, and knowing that your bypassing regulation willingly.

This type of installation needs to be reported to the insurance company. Remember, coverage applies to the state of your vehicle/home/property. If you DIY your own power source, the insurance company when informed about it, may drop your coverage.

If they know about the installation, its much harder for them to deny a claim. But a hidden installation like that, is a factor in claim denying.

And we are kind of ignoring the whole "your not just putting yourself at risk but also all the other people" issue".

It really couldn't. "Intentional" as it, you destroyed your property on purpose. Not "you were a dumbass and caused damage", not "you didn't apply for a permit and caused damage". Insurance covers stuff like that, because otherwise, a good half of claims could be getting denied. Basically all kitchen fires are "dumbass moments", for example.

The third option is hiring someone to certify it, usually requires submitting the plans beforehand. Afaik up to 800w you can do a lot DIY here but upwards you needs certification.

> What happens instead is that if you make a claim and the damage is by some stuff you didn't tell the insurer about, they will drop you right after they pay. Another possibility is that if they do any proactive inspections (e.g., drone fly-bys), they can decline to insure you or drop your policy.

This is also a pretty bad outcome.

Anecdata disagrees; insurance will reject payouts aggressively. I know someone whose house "coincidentally" burned down while his neighbor had a bonfire, and his insurance fought him for months.

Insurance will fight, but they have not the final decission. Here in Spain they were denying thousands of payouts for car accidents if the car was overdue in their ITV (yearly state mandated revision). But the judge had different thoughts, and they had to pay.

Big difference between refusing payout because of expired ITV and this installation.

If you alter your car its electrical harnas wiring and this creates a short somewhere, resulting in your car burning down ... that is a whole difference situation then missing a mandatory inspection. One is deliberate alteration of a vehicle and one is a inspection of condition.

Most insurances have a lot of protective language (for the insurance company), that often comes down to "everything needs to be code compliant/manufacture original/...".

The bigger the damage, the bigger the chance that insurance companies will fight you. If the above mentioned installation creates a small kitchen fire that cost a few 1000 bucks, they probably are not going to fight it.

But what happens if the above mentioned installation burns down the building, kills 5 people... Do not forget that the other neighbors / building owner's insurance companies, will go after your insurance if you are identified as the cause.

The issue is that if you go to court, and a fire comes from your apartment is from a accident, or a state like this, courts are willing to side with the victim party. But if a fire is the result of your own "tampering" with devices, electrical, etc, there is a very, VERY high chance that the court will side with the insurance provider. Insurances are not blank "do whatever you want, you get coverage" type of deals.

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