About 500 representatives of the solar installation industry attended the annual NABCEP Continuing Education Conference this week in San Diego. The professionals learned from experts in safety, installation, equipment, sales and more in technical sessions and panels spanning Sunday through Wednesday at a resort on Mission Bay.
In-between sessions, attendees had the opportunity to network and meet with manufacturers and service suppliers in an exhibit area, which had been sold out.
“We have a networking time, but it’s all about the class time,” said Richard Lawrence, executive director of NABCEP. “It’s about staying up-to-date on the latest products and issues and new developments.”
The conference is intended for NABCEP Certified Professionals who need continuing education credits in order to maintain their certification. The content presented is geared toward PV industry professionals who have several years of installation or technical sales experience.
The conference has grown every year, Lawrence said. Its location changes every year, too—from the West Coast, to the East Coast, to the Midwest—to provide easy access to installers, no matter where in the country one lives.
“Everybody here is an installer,” Lawrence said. “You go to some other tradeshows and there’s a much wider variety of people, which has its place, but this is a specific group of people getting the training needed to stay certified. And all of this is for the betterment of the solar industry as a whole.”
Check out these articles from some of the conference’s technical session presenters:
- Sizing solar inverters to prevent voltage drops
- What’s the right amount of flashing to use for waterproof solar installs?
- Using a direct DC transfer solution to better back-up solar
- Not all “UV rated” cable ties have long lifespans on solar projects
- Deep-cycle batteries need refresher charge during installation
- Keep NEC codes in mind when choosing combiner box for next solar project
- What cables and connectors do you need for energy storage installations?
- To maximize solar system value, offer consumption monitoring to customers
- What questions should you ask about solar+storage systems?
- Improving the solar installation process, starting at the sale
- How to install frameless solar modules
- Is your metal roof solar-ready?
- Ground-mount pre-assembly aids work speed on solar projects
- What codes and standards do you need to know to install rooftop solar?
- Tips for working on asphalt-shingle roofs
- Tips to comply with NEC 2014 rapid shutdown requirements
- How to get the most ROI out of your solar+storage system
- Practice safe installation techniques to prevent battery short circuits
- How to apply lean construction practices to optimize solar installation speed
- PVWatts can be used to model power optimizers
- How to deal with thermal expansion and contraction of rooftop solar systems
Read more about the NABCEP Conference here: http://www.nabcep.org/ce-2016