So solar panels have gone through a bit of a boon period the last couple of years, or so it seems from the amount of roofs locally to me where they have popped up. My house is all-electric so any help in reducing bills is a plus. Just wondering if anyone here has personal experience of them in order to get a non-marketing-hype opinion on them. I suspect there will be regional variations, but a general idea of the following would be great: - On average, how much electricity will one, south-facing, panel generate over the course of a year? Do they deliver what the salesman told you they would? - Are there different specs of panels that claim a range of performance? - If you don't have much availability in terms of south-facing roof space, how worthwhile would east/west-facing panels be? - Do issues re. leasing of roof-space and uncertainty over feed-in tariffs make them more hassle than they're worth?
Unfortunately it all depends on the sun. Which of course is a bit unpredictable in this country. To your question of how much will one panel generate, it depends on the wattage rating of the panel. As you can get different sized panels of different outputs. Currently my Dad has 4KW of solar panels on the roof and has done for nearly 18 months now. And so far they have been pretty good. During the day we can be using electricity generated by the panels without using anything from the grid! Got them installed by a company called American Solar, who were excellent during the install and providing after sales support. They installed the panels on the roof and a SolarEdge inverter in our attic, that takes the power from the panels and converts it to 240V mains for usage. Since the inverter is also network connected it allows us to monitor production and gives some nice graphs on the amount of power produced (see below). Pic of the panels on the roof, these are facing South West-ish: Energy production for this year: And energy production for this week: Hope this helps and gives you a bit more info!
we have 10 x 200w panels south facing (and ofc we live down south) heres our total output since the system went `live` a fraction under 2 years ago: peak out for us is around 1.7kw - when its nice and bright , we can use the tumble dryer on `low` and the input from the mains doesn't move (ofc!) - so its very nice. our annual usage for electric is 5300kwh and has stayed that since we got the lanels (3 teens in the house , various pc`s etc)
Good stuff. So how do these figures compare against the initial outlay, and what are the maintenance/servicing/lifespan implications?
I read that by the time they've paid themselves off, they'll be worn out and in need of replacement. True/false?
Depends on the initial outlay. I think for us it was about ~£8000. The pay back period was about 10 years-ish. (obviously all dependant on weather!) Lifetime for the panels is 25 years estimated.
since I rent and not bought my house , it was council fitted them and up keeping them (in fact today we have a had someone round to replace the none transmitting data). the subsidy level for them is HUGE something like £400 per mwh (new nuclear is £89) when the FIT`s were first launched and even today is £149 per mwh (that's 14.9 per kwh). you get 50% of the rated capacity back as FIT. as for payback - when the scheme was launched it was as little as 8 years , but now (including usage savings) its a bout 15 - with a 5k install cost you`ll have earnt about 7500 by year 20. http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/Generating-energy/Getting-money-back/Solar-Energy-Calculator have a look on your own property (get smart tools on your phone for direction and elevation (put the protractor app on an inside roof beam)
Have a look here: http://www.navitron.org.uk/ They have loads of info with parts for sale and check out their forum for help and advice.
We have a bunch of thermal solar panels (the big heat absorber things, not PV cells). I dunno how much the initial outlay was or what the energy savings are, but my impression is that we need to zero hot-water heating during the summer. For PV panels my impression is that, like electric vehicles. it still doesn't quite make financial sense right now although with govt incentives it might just be worth it.
Before laying out on this huge investment consider what has just happened is Spain. The government have just wacked a massive tax on all home owners with solar panels. This has rendered any investment void and people are removing them or disconecting them. This is sure to happen over here sooner or later with our criminal government. First they will lure everyone in with incentives, then it will be time to **** you over. It's becoming a tradition with our political system.
Wow. I read something a few years ago about pre 2008 generous solar panel subsidies being a huge financial burden in Spain. That's one way of dealing with it. The silly thing is solar is commercially viable in places such as southern Spain and the output peaks with air conditioning usage. In the UK it's a daft idea.
A few of the houses in our village have them. Neighbour was telling us about someone just down the road who had I think 6 panels on a south facing roof, and he beat the esimated repayment time by 2-3 months. I'm sure they had paid for themselves in 11 months. This was with the previous higher feed-in rate thing though, so might not be as good now. Really need south facing, my Dad looked at them when the high feed-in rate was still going, but we didn't have enough south facing for enough time during the day to make it worthwhile.
The most annoying thing is.......... according to the Boffins and their calculators................ placing solar panels on the Equator with the footprint of a large city would supply enough electricity for the whole Globe, and some to spare just in case the aliens needed to buy some Of course, the oil men and their puppet politicians don't want us to know this little nugget of info!
Not hard to figure out that a couple of thousand sq. km of solar panels might, potentially, produce a few petawatts, it's organising and distributing that power which is the obstacle. Physics is the enemy, not some mythical cabal of oil barons.
You can bet if the solution were that easy then all those oil men (with lots of cash) would be all over it. I hate to think what the initial drawdown would be.... Fact is, it's still so much cheaper to just dig up hydrocarbons from the ground the ol' fashioned way than having to to resort to high-tech experimental technology. You don't think the reason we don't use more nuclear power is environmental concerns, do you? Disclaimer: actually, it probably is; which is a bit silly considering the environmental issues surrounding nuclear fission are easily improvable.
IMO having 20 panels on a house roof is a silly idea , it doesn't make real sense to have all that infrastructure and maintenance requirements - rather have 500+ in a type 4 agricultural field , on stilts for 25 years (so animals can graze underneath) whilst the ground slowly reverts back to type 1.. type 4 is completely unsuitable for arabal farming
There is a planning application to do just that on marshland about 5 miles from me. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-north-east-wales-24480252
Well I think the thread's been worthwhile. My garage roof faces south but is low down and crowded out pretty badly from the sun by my house, my tree, and two neighbours' houses. My house has no south-facing roof. Ergo you guys have saved me some painful research time as clearly I can't justify that sort of investment right now. Thanks all.
Pretty much comes down to how far north you live. Generally, for the UK, you'll need high efficiency panels due to the lack of (intense) sunshine. Panel quality is very difficult to quantify. Everyone and their dog tells you their panels will last 25 years. They dont. The chinese ones are a lot cheaper but how the reliability and efficiency turns out noone knows. The german ones are expensive but at least the Solarworld guys (nextdoor to me) seem to be convinced of their own high quality.
