Making solar system, which inherently, is quite a reliable system, a bit more robust has always kept balance of system components - BOS - manufacturers going for more. Variety of sources of energy can be combined into one system system to best match the local conditions.
One such system was developed and implemented by APEX used solar and wind system to reduce dependancy on generator power. Generator, which was a primary source of energy for this industry - especially to run smaller night time appliances - has been replaced by solar + wind hybrid system. Solar and wind system charges a battery bank, which in turn supplies energy to the load at night times. If, due to changes in load or lower than expected sun or wind, the charge in the battery bank falls below certain level, generator is triggered to switch on.
Real time system data gathering an monitoring is used to communicate between the charge controllers and various relays on the system. Relays, based on the status of battery, would start the generator / switch a load off / switch a load on based on its program that is fed into it. Quite a treat to watch the system work!!!
