Safety disclaimer

These guides are general education. They are not a building permit, an engineering stamp, a wiring diagram for your house, or advice from a licensed trade. Local code, your insurer, and the manufacturer's instructions outrank a page on the internet. If a step does not match the hardware in front of you, stop.

Electrical

A photovoltaic module makes voltage in daylight, even when it is disconnected. Do not open locking connectors under load. Do not backfeed a panel through a dryer outlet or any other homemade cord. Do not tie a homemade system to the grid. Mains wiring, grounding, and interconnection belong to a licensed electrician. Do not put a life-support load on a hobby battery.

Roofs and ladders

A fall from a roof or a ladder is how this work kills people. If you are not equipped and willing to work tied off, keep the project on the ground. Stay off wet glazing and frost, and wear shoes that grip.

Pressure and hot water

A solar water loop can stagnate hot enough to boil, and a closed loop can build pressure. Leave a tank that is meant to be open vented to the air. Do not cap, plug, or paint shut a relief valve. Keep plastic tubing out of a glazed collector that can stagnate. If you cannot explain where the fluid goes when it overheats, do not fill the loop.

Combustion

Sealing a house, running a blower door, or adding a large exhaust fan can pull a combustion appliance the wrong way. Shut those appliances off before you depressurize the house. A carbon-monoxide alarm is not a flue test. This book does not give a recipe, a volume, or a pipe size for homemade biogas. Burn wood only in a listed appliance, with the flue that appliance requires.

Heat, glass, and the ground

Heat illness is a medical emergency. Tempered glass and twinwall still cut. Call before you dig. Solar cooking is not home canning. Drying food for storage follows a tested method from a food-safety authority. Do not drink untreated rainwater.

On the guides

Some guides show a short banner because the procedure itself involves electrical, roof, pressure, or combustion work. Every guide also has its own safety note. Hire the trade that is allowed to sign the job when the work requires one.

If a safety statement here is wrong, report the correction.