Solar power. Can you please explain a few things?

Right the FIL is thinking of having solar panels fitted to his roof. The “salesmen” have been round and done there spiel. He’s a clever chap and is very money savvy.
They are telling him he signs up and when the calcs are done his house will return x amount of pounds every day. He will get that figure no matter what the sunlight hours. On top of that, what he actually generates during the day is then deducted off what he actually uses. So in lamens if he generates 5kw and uses 4kw he pays nothing , if he generates 5kw and uses 6kw he pays for 1kw.
Does all this sound plausible?

Not quite. He will be paid for each kW of energy he generates, regardless. If he does not have a smart Meyer then he will get a smaller sum for 50% of the energy i.e. it is assumed that he uses 50% and the other half is bought off him. Of course if he uses his own generated energy, then he does not have to pay for any supplied. If there is no sunshine however nothing is generated.

Plausible but may not be true. I went to a festival a few years ago that as well as bands had talks on various green issues/technologies. There was a chap there from a well know solar panel installers who admitted he was a bit trolled from the free beer, which loosened his tongue. He blurted out that the bottom line was that solar energy wasn’t actually a good investment for homeowners as it would take too long; instead it should be seen as a lifestyle choice to feel good about. “Rather like a Porsche” were his words. Bit of a Ratner moment, but informative nonetheless. Plus AIUI the deal may involve a covenant on your property which prevents you and future owners from ditching the panels.

sadmadalan has got it. The tariff is about to drop too if I remember. Panels are cheaper now than a couple of years ago but the tariff is much lower too. The breakeven is probably still around 7-10 years but the profit in the remaining period will be lower.
The rate of return is probably better than if the capital is in a bank account earning little interest but I would be concerned that the money is effectively tied up. If you find you need a lump sum for, say, an urgent operation, you can’t get to it.
Not saying they are a bad investment, just that there are other sides to it to consider.
Also, I would steer clear of the “rent a roof” free electricity brigade. I can’t see much in it to offset the possible hassle with house sale in the future.
Rich.

By the sounds of it, this is one of those deals where they fit the panels for free and the company who installs them pay you? If so, the details need to be looked at very closely as some appear to be okay deals, while others seem to be less so. One thing to bear in mind with these deals is that they might make the house harder to sell if there is something like this in place.

If it’s not one of those, and your FIL is going to be paying for the installation himself then have a look at the page about Feed-In Tarrifs on the Energy Saving Trust website here, although the figures are slightly out of date, the rest of it is correct.

But basically, you get paid for every unit of electricity you generate, not for whatever the installed capacity is, the current rate is about 13p/kWh for new installs less than 4kW, slightly less for larger ones.

On top of this you also get paid for every unit that you export to the grid. As said above, you’d theoretically get paid by calculating how much you used and how much you generated, but unless you have a smart meter they can’t do that, so just assume you export 50% of what you generate. The current rate for this is about 5p/kWh

The actual rate you are paid depends on when the installation is registered with the energy supplier and is adjusted (usually down) every 3 months or so, but once registered it is fixed, alnd indexed linked, for the next 20 years.

Bear in mind also that you need to use the power whilst its being generated, there’s no storage. So great if you’re around and can stick your washing on at midday, etc when the sun’s high. If not, you’re still getting paid the same, just using more imported power if you do things like this in the evenings. I had a projected payback of 8.5 years and it’s already looking like we’ll beat that. And fuel prices are only ever going to go up, so you can factor that in too.

Yeah that was his point. They’re retired so at home all day unless (spending all my inheritance) on holiday so the using of the power in the day won’t be a problem. Perhaps I’m over cynical and it may pay off for them.

Bear in mind also that you need to use the power whilst its being generated, there’s no storage

It can actually be tricky using all the generated power sometimes. We have a 4Kw install that’s now about 2 years old and when it’s nice a sunny it can be generating 3.5Kw – this is quite a lot to be using at any one time in normal circumstances.
I’ve just fitted a SolarImmersion unit that’s a proportional controller – it monitors the flow of power into and out the house and automatically sends any excess to the immersion heater circuit (when the water is hot it sends the power to a secondary heating system such as electric storage heater or similar). This way you’re actually storing the surplus generated power as hot water.
In the next few years there will be an increasing amount of battery storage available on the market. This will allow you to hopefully store surplus power for use after dark. One of the big inverter suppliers is already offering an inverter with built-in battery storage.

Our electricity bill is £9 a month plus we get cheques every quarter. Ours are working very nicely for us thanks.

That’s a nice idea sharkbait. You’re right though, cost effective storage is the missing link.

Batteries pollute more than the panels, have a more limited life, and aren’t the answer to storage. Pump storage.

Wrightyson

I used to sell and install solar PV and have helped a. Couple of folk on here. If you have the quote and the payback calculations, I can give them the once over for accuracy/bullshit.

Email in profile if you want to.

Also, if you invest now In an electricity monitor, you can see the peak demand of the house and make a judgement as to how much the folks will actually use.

I have seen (and sacked) salesmen telling all sorts of crap to get the sale so know what to look for!

Thanks smudger. Will (hopefully) get the details off the fil and mail them on to you. Love this place at times!

Even better returns if you’ve got an old mechanical electricity meter. I’ve had a 3Kw system for a while now and I’ve only just had a new digital meter fitted when my supplier realised they weren’t making any money out of me during the summer times. I ended-up with a negative meter reading so had to add just 1KwH to the previous reading for the on-line system to accept the reading……………it was so satisfying watching the disc spin backwards at a high rate of knots.

Just be aware that your electicity suppliers may well come back at you with an estimated bill for the ‘free’ power you’ve been using – pretty sure they’re within their rights too.
It could be pricey.

Our solar was wired incorrectly [it was fed into the supply side of our import meter rather into into the consumer unit] and has only just been fixed. Our meter also runs backwards but I’ll be letting them know this week.

AlSo, watch out if they live in the middle of nowhere, fed from an overhead spur. You might find you get high volts during sunny days that will trip out the inverter and if the 11kV transformer gets tapped down to sort this, you may get low volts on cold winter nights. The distribution grid in this country was never designed for this type of low voltage embedded generation.

Onzadog has a good point but any decent installer will do a mains voltage check before installing PV – if they haven’t ( and esp if a long run from the transformer) might be worth asking why not.

Is the house as well insulated, airtight and generally tippety top? If not, putting money into the house could well reduce the energy consumed by more than a deal like this could bring them. Get the house itself sorted, then think about the bling for the roof.

House is fully sorted, plus its a bungalow so only one level to heat. He also has analogue type meter do it would seem it all stacks up to actually working.

Wrightyson – hope I wasn’t coming over as negative – I’ve got them and they are brilliant – just wanted to make you aware of some of the things to watch out for.

Not at all smudger, appreciate your input. The FIL is a very astute chap but likes a gadget/gimmick. He’s also 70 so I was just making sure on his behalf that it all stacked up something like they had suggested it would.

Just remember, the money you get paid comes from a bit being added to everyone else’s bill. This is wrong, and hits the poorest the hardest.

If you’re ok with that, also remember also that the rest of us are gonna get sick of paying you to have a blue shiny roof – to the extent that stopping it could be a vote winning issue.

If we really wanted to collect environmentally helpful ‘stuff’ from our roofs, we’d be collecting rainwater for toilet flushing, showers, washing machine etc.

Just remember, the money you get paid comes from a bit being added to everyone else’s bill. This is wrong, and hits the poorest the hardest.

It does seem a perverse scheme, it’s basically like an artificially high interest rate paid to people with a lot of money to save. Funded by those who can’t afford to save.

If we really wanted to collect environmentally helpful ‘stuff’ from our roofs, we’d be collecting rainwater for toilet flushing, showers, washing machine etc.

Not quite right. The systems you’d have to put into the house to ensure that water is and remains clean enough for the job, storage tank etc creates a larger ‘footprint’ than the water being treated and managed on a mass basis as it is now. Some things work out cheaper and better when you do them communally.

Before people get angry with solar producers check out the rate paid to the gas-fired plants that provide peak-demand electricity. Both wind and solar are cheaper and by reducing the need for very expensive peak production cut costs. Building in buffers such as pump storage also make greater savings than you would think as they compete with and substitute for peak-demand, gas-fired plants.