[jwr]

I'm building a house where I'm doing exactly that. LED panels powered from a 48V solar installation.

We'll see how things go, but on paper at least this makes a lot of sense if you don't try to run things at 12V (why do people still try?). 48V is a voltage that is still safe, but cuts your amperage and losses to reasonable numbers.

While designing my own LED drivers, I found that most LED panels will internally work with a Vf of 36V, which you can efficiently get from your 48V installation.

Even in an AC-powered home, if you have lots of LED lighting in one place, it makes sense to use a single high-power converter to get 48V DC and then drive LEDs off that. Small AC to DC converters are inefficient.