i maintain that pfc by means of capacitors are far cheaper and easier than additional fuel for a generator, larger windgenerators, larger inverters, larger pv panels, etc. etc.
Assuming your wires are heavy enough that heating them is not
a major fraction of your power usage, a bad power factor doesn't
make any significant difference in your fuel usage, battery
discharge, etc.
What it DOES do is reduce the amount of REAL power you can get
out of your generator, inverter, etc.
In the case of a generator, your generator just runs out-of-phase
(leading) to make it up. The limit on your generator's output is
the current it produces. The power pulled from the motor shaft just
provides the real power (which includes the power running your
refrigerator, plus the heating of the generator coils and house wiring.)
Similarly with the energy pulled from the raw DC supply inside your
inverter. The reactive power pulls energy to magnetize the core of
the generator, then PUTS IT BACK into the raw power supply when that
part of the core is demagnetized again as the cycle moves on.
Where it might bite you is that you might need a bigger inverter
to provide enough current to run the motor. There are losses in
the converter's guts that are proportional to its maximum capacity,
so a bigger inverter pulls more power just sitting there turned on.
And (as with "copper losses" in a genny) there are also losses that
are (non-linearly) related to the current pulled rather than the
power pulled (i.e. not all of that magnetizing energy gets back into
the raw supply.) So, like the power company, you do lose SOME real
energy if you have to "generate" reactive power. Nowhere near as much
as if you needed one VA to provide one VAR. But it's not zero either.
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