Solar panels

[Ian Morgan]

I am not sure why people are so obsessed by the 'payback' time when considering solar panels. Do they also work out the 'payback' time when they buy a new TV or a new car? How long do they have to keep the new TV for the saving in the reduced power it requires pays for the TV?

 

Pay £500 for a new TV, you need to save 1.6MWh of energy to pay for it. If the new TV uses 10W less than your old TV (an average modern TV uses about 50W), it needs to be on for 160,000 hours to pay for itself. If it is on for 8 hours per day, every day, that would be about 80 years.

 

Just saying ...

 

 

 

 

[hayfield]

10 minutes ago, Ian Morgan said:

I am not sure why people are so obsessed by the 'payback' time when considering solar panels. Do they also work out the 'payback' time when they buy a new TV or a new car? How long do they have to keep the new TV for the saving in the reduced power it requires pays for the TV?

 

Pay £500 for a new TV, you need to save 1.6MWh of energy to pay for it. If the new TV uses 10W less than your old TV (an average modern TV uses about 50W), it needs to be on for 160,000 hours to pay for itself. If it is on for 8 hours per day, every day, that would be about 80 years.

 

Just saying ...

 

 

 

 

 

Ian

 

You do make a good point and even buying a modest second hand car is more expensive and perhaps other considerations are more important.

 

My last smart TV cost me £299 (JVC on offer at Curry's last year *) where as in installation for solar panels now probably £4000 (as no large discounts are available) quite a difference. As for the TV I looked around for what was the best value (not cheapest). " years ago I changed my car, running costs were important to me and my car is saving me money on my previous car. Had I been working I would have taken other things into consideration

 

I was interested in payback time for several reasons, firstly adverts to buy them state payback times, I am retired so its either using income from our savings and pensions to pay for energy or a capital expenditure to reduce energy costs. So this for those of us who stop working it is important for our capital to work for us. As it happens a brilliant investment in today's climate and nothing that any of us could have foreseen, but at the same time I must have had slight concerns about electric prices. The other thing to take into account is that had I not bought the system my investment would have reduced in spendable power by at least 11% if not 15% over the past 15 months

 

My system is guaranteed for 10 years, I will have in the future costs to repair replace items, again this is where payback comes into consideration 

 

*   I was wrongly told by a BT engineer that my old TV was at fault for a reception issue with my BT TV service, as it happens the fault was the engineer failed to plug in the aerial to our aerial amplifier, still the new TV is much smarter than the last one !!

[spamcan61]

1 hour ago, Ian Morgan said:

I am not sure why people are so obsessed by the 'payback' time when considering solar panels. Do they also work out the 'payback' time when they buy a new TV or a new car? How long do they have to keep the new TV for the saving in the reduced power it requires pays for the TV?

 

Because watching TV is a recreational activity, there is no such equivalent for a solar panel, it's just there to generate electricity.

[Hibelroad]

I’m just starting to look into solar panels now I have a decent south facing roof following a house move. I’m also hoping to include a battery. I can do the maths regarding pay back time but that won’t be my prime concern as I am more interested in having security of supply and being self sufficient to a degree. We can only guess at future electricity prices but I will feel a bit more secure with a panel/battery system. 

[Tony_S]

54 minutes ago, Hibelroad said:

I’m just starting to look into solar panels now I have a decent south facing roof following a house move. I’m also hoping to include a battery. I can do the maths regarding pay back time but that won’t be my prime concern as I am more interested in having security of supply and being self sufficient to a degree. We can only guess at future electricity prices but I will feel a bit more secure with a panel/battery system. 

If you want to be able to operate off grid you will need to specify some additional kit. Our solar panel battery system will shut down in the event of no grid supply. 
We were never bothered by payback time. We wanted to reduce bills and had,the money for the install as we hadn’t been on holiday for a few years. Actually I think my wife likes the solar panel app more than most television. Today although it is cold here in South Essex it is really sunny. Our batteries are 100% charged, we have all the electricity we need and the surplus is going to the grid. Very unusual for December.

[hayfield]

1 hour ago, Hibelroad said:

I’m just starting to look into solar panels now I have a decent south facing roof following a house move. I’m also hoping to include a battery. I can do the maths regarding pay back time but that won’t be my prime concern as I am more interested in having security of supply and being self sufficient to a degree. We can only guess at future electricity prices but I will feel a bit more secure with a panel/battery system. 

 

I have no issue with any reasons people have for solar panels, whilst my total energy footprint is quite small my driver is to better use my own resources

 

If its saving the planet that's fine with me, but please don't buy gas gussling cars and travel by air. Nothing wrong with being self sufficient, but its a lot harder than buying a few panels

 

Good luck

[spamcan61]

23 minutes ago, Tony_S said:

 Actually I think my wife likes the solar panel app more than most television. 

Sounds fair to me!

[black and decker boy]

Personal reasons for going Solar:

less dependant on the grid so more security and cost certainty

a low carbon source for my EV and to please my 7yr old son

to maintain attractiveness our house in the event we want to sell

 

all new build houses started from mid 2023 will be coming with a raft of lower carbon aspects including solar panels and air source heat pumps as Building Tegs have changed and such items are effectively now the default. 
 

as to why consider payback period, well it’s a five figure investment (not £500 for a TV) to self generate something readily available so it’s a choice rather than a necessity but one that only works over the long term. Few would bother with solar if mains prices were single pence / KWh

[Ouroborus]

10 hours ago, Ian Morgan said:

If it is on for 8 hours per day, every day, that would be about 80 years.

 

 

 

I reckon my workshy benefit scamming neighbour across the road should comfortably achieve that

[Vistisen]

I got my panels in May this year. By dividing at what we paid in bills by the amount bought from the net for the whole of 2022, I get an average price of about 60p per kilowatt hour. If I add the amount we have generated minus what I sold I get my actual consumption, I can see that if we had bought it all from the net. our electricity bill would have been about £3700 ( we have two hybrid cars) If I take the amount we have actually paid in bills, minus what I get refunded for charging my company car, and the amount I have got for selling the about 5Mwh we have produced, but did not use. I can see that even after deducting  the loan payments we are still about £800 in profit. So I am a very happy man. 

[hayfield]

21 hours ago, hayfield said:

Steve we have issues with shading from mid morning for an hour, first a big fir tree then a house roof then for a couple of hours from 12**. I always thought we faced south, well the garden does but the house is SSE facing at 155 degrees. The shading is worse at ground level but on the 1st floor much better. We are at home all day so can take advantage of the power we produce

 

We can find flaws in everything, but the figures in the initial forecast looked promising, sadly due to the energy crisis it has proved a godsend. No doubt over time I may regret not having a full set of 12 panels in total using both roofs and not installing a battery, but at this moment I am more than happy

 

My daughter and son in law is moving to a new property next year, he has decided to fit solar panels, they do have a hybrid car so can take advantage of using surplus energy for the car, but like me he initially thinks more is good, rather than analyse what they will need, still when the estimates arrive I guess they may change their minds  

 

** edited 

 

 

Our system is handicapped in the winter firstly by the shallower rake of our roof and as the sun drops lower in the sky up to half the daylight hours are lost to shading. These factors were taken into account in the initial projection along with the SSE direction of the roof, though strangely on some days its far less pronounced than others as for some reason the sun breaks through the branches better than others, or is it than the sun is reaching its lowest orbit ? But the worst culprit is the days of thick cloud

[hayfield]

10 hours ago, Vistisen said:

I got my panels in May this year. By dividing at what we paid in bills by the amount bought from the net for the whole of 2022, I get an average price of about 60p per kilowatt hour. If I add the amount we have generated minus what I sold I get my actual consumption, I can see that if we had bought it all from the net. our electricity bill would have been about £3700 ( we have two hybrid cars) If I take the amount we have actually paid in bills, minus what I get refunded for charging my company car, and the amount I have got for selling the about 5Mwh we have produced, but did not use. I can see that even after deducting  the loan payments we are still about £800 in profit. So I am a very happy man. 

 

 

Our main saving like yours was our dependence on the grid from 3400 kwh to 2040 kwh a year (40% reduction) then the amount we export (1749kwh)

 

This is not the benefit we have received as we have paid and received payment at 3 differing rates, but the potential at current rates are as follows

 

1360 kwh not bought from the grid @35p = £476  plus 1749 kwh exported £262. in total the benefit could be £738 in the next 12 months.

 

The cost of my system was £2688 so the payback at best could be in 3.65 years and that's not taking the reduction in spendable power my capital would have occurred by the effects of inflation which over the last 16 months would have been £300 (perhaps I should have both filled both roofs with batteries and bought a set of batteries!!

 

The truth is to date I have benefited in hard cash probably between 50 to 60% of these numbers, but going forward as I said the potential is much greater

 

As I said the system will need maintaining, its guaranteed for 10 years then after that I have been warned the inverter will need changing, plus the production will decline, but there is plenty of surplus income to cover these costs. I am told the life span of the system is 25 years, but there will be running costs in the years to come

[hayfield]

With a couple of days to go, energy production has picked up a bit during the past week and has with a couple of days to go matched last years production 20 kwh. Last January was equally poor with 44 kwh produced, but what can we expect in the winter, I guess anything is a bonus

[hayfield]

Well the first full calendar year has ended, with December in the end just struggling over last years production, despite both the long rainy period and the snow before

 

The 14mths production has produced 2,9 mwh, this period has had 1 1/2 winter periods so I am very pleased with the effectiveness of the system despite the handicaps of being on a shallow rake on a single story roof and the effects of shading in the winter

 

I have said before the expected annual production was 2205. 2022 ended with 2487 kwh being a 12.8% increase, I guess to a certain degree its slightly downhill from here, but I assume the weather will have a bigger say in production than reduction of performance. 

 

Well a happy new year to all those who contribute to this thread and lets hope for another sunny year  

[sjp23480]

Hi John,

Thanks for the update, we managed to generate 49kwh in December and 515kwh since the installation at the end of August. 

 

The real shock for us was our gas bill in December, which topped £430!

 

With the new tariff from Jan1, I am not looking forward to the next 2-3 months.  We were almost £1000 in credit in October, but this has been whittled down to <£600 now.  Seems like Eon were right to hike my DDI, but we will see.

 

Let's hope for a sunny 2023!

 

Steve

 

 

[hayfield]

5 minutes ago, sjp23480 said:

Hi John,

Thanks for the update, we managed to generate 49kwh in December and 515kwh since the installation at the end of August. 

 

The real shock for us was our gas bill in December, which topped £430!

 

With the new tariff from Jan1, I am not looking forward to the next 2-3 months.  We were almost £1000 in credit in October, but this has been whittled down to <£600 now.  Seems like Eon were right to hike my DDI, but we will see.

 

Let's hope for a sunny 2023!

 

Steve

 

 

 

Steve

 

£439 !!! wow, my total gas and electricity bill (£331) looks quite modest in comparison, certainly since the 26th my gas usage has been steadily  reducing from £8 per day to £4 a day. Electric usage is still high but we have elderly guests so are using more rooms and I have increased the temperature on the thermostats

 

Like everyone else we use more energy in the cooler months, but I usually pay the same DDI payment every month to smooth out the bills. December was the first month where my credit balance has dropped, but that's what its there for. Octopus's forecast is for a higher bill in January, Well we are 7 days into the Jan accounting period and the next 10 days of weather looks to be much the same. Hopefully the bills will be coming down, and less subsidy will be required

[hayfield]

Good to see both the days getting longer and sunny spells every other day. What is surprising is that Sunset is past 4pm, where as sunrise is still not before 8am

 

Sadly though as last January my system produced 44 kwh, the first 10 days produced 8 kwh. Still a long way to go despite a bit of a cold snap forecast in a few days,

[Kris]

We started the process of getting them fitted back in August 2022 asking for quotes etc. 

Of the 4 companies I contacted, 1 came back to us after about 2 months, 1 came back after 3 months, the other 2 never came back to us. 

We took up the only offer that we received back in October. At the time we were told that the the fitting would be June / July. 

Today, we had a phone call today about the solar panels that we are waiting to have fitted. Apparently I had missed an email that told us we would have the panels fitted in September (over a year after we first started going down this route). Thankfully the phone call say that there has been a cancellation that means our slot can be moved forward to May.

[hayfield]

Good to see the industry is catching up, and that you will be getting maximum benefit from the start of installation

 

Do get your supplier sorted out ASAP if you can, otherwise you may miss out on a decent return on your energy exports, check out what's on offer, unless you are on a fixed rate deal

Edited January 13, 2023 by hayfield

[Mike 84C]

Up here in Lincolnshire trying to get any interest from solar panel suppliers is impossible. An interview with the Pope would be easier!  Meanwhile plans have just been announced for a solar farm big enough to supply 180000 houses, whats wrong in fitting 180000 houses with solar panels? no loss of good farmland and help food security.

[uax6]

6 minutes ago, Mike 84C said:

Up here in Lincolnshire trying to get any interest from solar panel suppliers is impossible. An interview with the Pope would be easier!  Meanwhile plans have just been announced for a solar farm big enough to supply 180000 houses, whats wrong in fitting 180000 houses with solar panels? no loss of good farmland and help food security.

 

Ah, but then there is no money to be made by a big company is there? All the benefits would go to the individual house owners...

 

Andy G 

[Jonboy]

35 minutes ago, Mike 84C said:

Up here in Lincolnshire trying to get any interest from solar panel suppliers is impossible. An interview with the Pope would be easier!  Meanwhile plans have just been announced for a solar farm big enough to supply 180000 houses, whats wrong in fitting 180000 houses with solar panels? no loss of good farmland and help food security.

Or fitting 1000 warehouse/supermarket/shopping centre/office block roofs.

[Phil Himsworth]

I tried several times to contact a couple of local companies and had no response to calls or emails. I still see their advertising around the place, though, so do they want more work or not? Very strange.

 

Vastly more land is used for biofuels than solar PV, at a much lower yield of energy per area. Nobody complains about that, though, because it still looks like a field.

 

Giving farmers an extra income stream by letting them use a few fields for solar, which is more profitable than most forms of agriculture, is a far better way to secure farming in this country.

 

Land used for solar PV is also better for biodiversity than crop fields, which in turn increases crop yields of surrounding land as well as just being a good thing anyway.

 

We can - and should - put solar panels both on roofs and the ground.

[hayfield]

26 minutes ago, Phil Himsworth said:

I tried several times to contact a couple of local companies and had no response to calls or emails. I still see their advertising around the place, though, so do they want more work or not? Very strange.

 

Vastly more land is used for biofuels than solar PV, at a much lower yield of energy per area. Nobody complains about that, though, because it still looks like a field.

 

Giving farmers an extra income stream by letting them use a few fields for solar, which is more profitable than most forms of agriculture, is a far better way to secure farming in this country.

 

Land used for solar PV is also better for biodiversity than crop fields, which in turn increases crop yields of surrounding land as well as just being a good thing anyway.

 

We can - and should - put solar panels both on roofs and the ground.

 

 

I see in some places they cover car parks with solar panels, which to me sounds a great idea using the same piece of land for 2 uses. I guess the infrastructure is more costly, but better than using productive land.

[Mike 84C]

Just come back from Newark, passing RAF Cranwell there is a large arable farm with approx; 250 acres of solar panels covering land on which wheat used to be grown. At 3/4t per acre thats a shortfall  of 750/1000t of wheat that could be sold into the local poultry feed market. Looking at the buildings on said farm non seem to have any panels on their roof's. If grants were still available to the public for PV panels  and for warehouse/ big sheds/office blocks and the country was still short of generating capacity I could go with solar farms. But its the easy way first, lets pick the low hanging fruit. And the NFU has a very powerful lobby.

   As part of planning for on farm digesters the applicant should have to collect food waste from the nearest town/hospitals etc; but no, lets grow so called energy crops like maize which takes more land out of food production!

  Fallen off my soap box!! but there is little joined up thinking.  To my mind its close the nukes and demolish the coal fired power stations before having viable replacements in place.