One homeowner with two garage refrigerators took to social media to see whether they could power the appliances with an idle home battery.
They shared their questions on Reddit's r/Ecoflow_Community.
Here's what to know
In the Reddit thread, the original poster described their setup. They have an 8-kilowatt rooftop solar system and a Delta 3 Ultra Plus plugged into a household outlet. And with a 90% charge target, the battery's daily charging window runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
OP then asked the forum, "Would it be feasible to move my Delta 3 Ultra to the garage, plug the two refrigerators into the Delta 3 Ultra plus, powering them overnight, and when 9am comes around, the Delta 3 Ultra Plus will start charging again… This would reduce overnight household power draw from the grid from the two refrigerators."
The top comment read, "Absolutely this would be doable. Although I do not know whether or not there is an option to charge at a specific time of day. But what you can do is tell it to charge from solar and only charge from the grid if the charge gets below a certain threshold, such as 25%."
A second user agreed, writing, "Yes, I think that would work. Plug both refrigerators into the D3 Ultra Plus and let it run them overnight, then have it recharge between 9am and 4pm when your solar is producing. I would test it for a few days first and see how much battery the two refrigerators actually use overnight."
Multiple other commenters shared their app settings from their Delta units.
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Adding battery storage is one of the best ways to protect your home during outages and gain more energy independence. As the thread shows, paired with rooftop solar, storage can also be one of the best ways to save money on energy by using more of the electricity generated at home.
For people considering appliance-level backup, Pila is another company offering strong battery backup options. Pila's plug-and-play batteries cost a fraction of a whole-home backup system. They can also protect individual devices, like refrigerators.
Where can I learn more?
Other homeowners have shared what happened when they used batteries to run refrigerators or store power for later.
• A homeowner's 2-kWh EcoFlow battery powered a full-size refrigerator for about 22 hours.
• A portable battery owner saw battery charge drop 10% with a refrigerator connected despite wall power.
• U.K. battery owners called charging during off-peak hours a "no-brainer," even without rooftop solar.
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