Yes, in fact it’s better than lead-acid batteries. It has improved charge density and reliability. The cells don’t need any electrolytre to work, so no fumes and no top ups. 

Not only this but lithium-ion batteries can be manufactured with more granular control over the output voltage. So you if your system works with a specific voltage, the battery can be built to work with it.

Lithium batteries work seamlessly in any application where lead-acid batteries can be used. And they do so with better reliability, less maintenance and longer life, which makes them perfect for the job.

It depends on how much power you need to store. Calculating the required size takes a bit of effort but it’s better than having a battery bank that’s too small or two large. Here’s how to do it:

1. Calculate your house or building’s daily average demand in terms of kWh.
2. Check the weather tresnds and estimate how many days your area gets low sunlight. (This is important)

Once you have these two factors you can calculate the average monthly energy requirement for your solar system. (Including the energy consumed on days where there is not enough sunlight)

Once you have that figure, use it to calculate the daily consumption by dividing by 30. Let’s say your daily consumption is 10 kWh.

Npw you need to account for inefficiency and the fact that you can’t deplete your battery fully. So for an 80% depth of discharge, you need 20% extra capacity. That makes it 12kWh. Additionally, lithium batteries are about 95% efficient so we need to add 5% on top of this. The final figure come out to be 12.6 kWh or 12600 Wh.

Now that you have the power you need to store, converting this to battery capacity is as simple as dividing the power by your battery’s voltage. So 12600 divided by 12.8 gives us 984 Ah. This means that for this example you’d need about 5 batteries of 200 Ah each.

Most lithium batteries for solar panels and inverters are rated for a life of 2000 discharge cycles or about 5 years. This life can be extended with care and proper charging and by not discharging the battery fully.

As for the battery’s timing, that depends on the system it’s installed in and can be calculated by the method detailed above. This should give you a good idea of how long your battery bank will keep your home powered.