Solar energy and the Feed-In Tariff - your opinions
- Thread starter Thomas L
- Start date
hw can it possibly be deemed illegal. They haven't slashed prices for people all ready guaranteed. Mind boggling any news reports explaining it?
They are questioning the legalilty of bringing in the changes before the official consultation was finished....not the legality of actually reducing them.
They are not saying it is illegal...but legally flawed, as in there may be some question over whether the consultation is required to report prior to action being taken if a consultation has been ordered by the Government, as in this case.
All seems a bit of a storm in a teacup tbh.
Soldato
I suppose the main thing is that there is no easily available/obvious way to go about finding out the environmental impact of making these solar panels, while the monetary side of things is well documented and easy to find out about... I suppose most people just assume that solar panels are 'good' for the environment, after all there has been a huge amount of indoctrination telling the public that they are. My family recently got solar panels at my suggestion (sorted out only days before the brought-forward deadline!), and I think the financial implications were the primary reason behind agreeing to get them - without the feed in tariff it would just have been a small yet very expensive gesture... I think they wouldn't mind being a little bit out of pocket, but if you had to foot the bill of PV installation with no incentive it would feel like a massive waste of money. (Especially considering that solar panels are a rather inefficient way for people in the UK to reduce carbon emissions).Money wise, we can all do a quick calculation to see whether the investment is worth it.
Environmental wise, solar panels aren't the cleanest to make, so if you get one manufactured to save (usually) coal being burnt in a power plant, where is the break even point here?
This isn't questioning anymore who has bought solar panels - You have all bought them to save money, but a question I find of interest is are they really any better as you have to source the raw materials, process the materials, manufacture and distribute the panels. Also they must be disposed of at end of life.
Just a point I thought I would raise as everyone these days is talking about the environment, with the dreaded term 'emissions'.
Making a decision bases on purely financial considerations is exactly why the world is in the mess it is in already, it just happens that reducing fossil fuel use saves money and helps the environment i.e a 'win win' situation.
(I use the term 'helps the environment' very loosely - The phase 'buggers it ever so slightly less' is probably more appropriate).
I personally was keen to take advantage of the FiT as it seems like a reasonably good investment, and good way to personally/familially to reduce emissions. However, in a general sense, I think the FiT is a rubbish idea. Subsidising something as unsuited to the UK as PV panels is just ridiculous. Especially considering it is essentially taxpayers money paying for it (Sure, extracted from them without ever going through the taxman, but it will result in extra costs on everyone elses electricity bill), I think it would make far more sense to collect taxpayers money (maybe in the same way - by charging a few percent more on electricity bills), and use it to buy capacity that would be much more useful - funding a new nuclear plant maybe, which would cost less per kWh produced in the end, and be more suitable for replacing coal plants...
Anyway, I'm glad that they are reducing the FiT as it seems like a massively poor use of money to me, but from a personal point of view I'm happy to take advantage of it. - Am I immoral or what? - condoning wasting other peoples money like that...
Ah, I do feel dirty when I say 'help the environment'... it has become part of my lexicon through influence of others, but every time I say it I know what I really mean is 'not raping the environment quite so hard in order to make my frivalous Western lifestyle possible'. I don't imagine we would have described Hitler as 'helping the Jews' if he had decided only to exterminate half of them (or just decided to exterminate them more slowly), yet that is the logic we use when talking about the environment... from now on I think I will make an effort to point this out to people now (and will probably henceforth be known as 'that pedantic ***** over there').
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Indeed, in a steady state it is a bad idea to subsidise a technology that doesn't return as much energy per £ as other technologies. However, the solar industry is anything but steady. Several reports are now projecting grid parity, no subsidies needed, for PV in the UK by ~2016. If PV really can meet grid parity in a few years then this stimulus will have been money well spent. Time will tell.
Can you explain what is meant by Grid Parity?
Cost per watt produced will be the same as the existing grid, using the conventional methods.
Thanks.
Actually it's cost per kwh. But same thing ish.
More info here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_parity
And some people still think sola isn't sustainable, usable or cost effective.
More info here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_parity
And some people still think sola isn't sustainable, usable or cost effective.
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Soldato
Well that would be great if it does hit grid parity soon, but I'm not sure that would make the money spent NOW well spent. I can appreciate that buying more solar panels might mean that the manufacturers will make more profit and thus have more money to put back into development, but I imagine that the UK market is a tiny proportion of the global PV market. The manufacturers would probably make similar progress whether we had a FiT or not, so I don't see why that makes spending money now justified, at least not from a British taxpayers cost/benefit point of view.
I had another thought just now, not sure if I'm missing something:
depending on the actual rate of costs decreasing, this might mean that buying solar panels now might increase the net CO2 emissions over the next 20 years, if we consider spending the same amount on some PV panels now and next year, which would make the environmentally preferable option holding off. - e.g. if we can get 7% more power for our money every year, then over a 20 year period, buying panels now might save 20 units of CO2 emission by replacing fossil fuel energy sources, but buying panels next year might result in 1.07*19=20.33 units CO2 emission saved. So obviously depending on the timeframe you're looking at (maybe related to some kind of government emissions target, climate change model, or just the lifetime of the PV panels themselves), and the actual rate at which the costs are decreasing this would be a better or worse idea... Of course, assuming the lifetime of the panels remained the same, the lifetime CO2 emission reduction would be even larger.
Funny you should mention that. Have a trawl through Elsevier or the International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment if you get 5 minutes spare at uni, but I think there haven't been any LCAs done on the latest technology panels yet. I know for a fact that nothing has been carried out on the organic tech yet and it was something that my work were thinking of doing to check if it was worthwhile pursuing the technology, environmentally, or sticking with improving the older silicon panels.Environmental wise, solar panels aren't the cleanest to make, so if you get one manufactured to save (usually) coal being burnt in a power plant, where is the break even point here?
This isn't questioning anymore who has bought solar panels - You have all bought them to save money, but a question I find of interest is are they really any better as you have to source the raw materials, process the materials, manufacture and distribute the panels. Also they must be disposed of at end of life.
Just a point I thought I would raise as everyone these days is talking about the environment, with the dreaded term 'emissions'
Making a decision bases on purely financial considerations is exactly why the world is in the mess it is in already, it just happens that reducing fossil fuel use saves money and helps the environment i.e a 'win win' situation.
(I use the term 'helps the environment' very loosely - The phase 'buggers it ever so slightly less' is probably more appropriate).
Don't also forget that there is a massive capital impact, environmentally, with a coal, gas or oil power station. There is also an entire distribution network and non-renewable resource depletion associated with those power stations and network losses to take into account.
Ultimately you're going to end up with a trade-off of some sort. To save CO2 emissions there will be an environmental impact elsewhere, either at end of life or some kind of material depletion. The main problem at the moment is political-driven scarcity, because a lot of the materials used to make panels efficient are restricted by China export quotas.
In my professional opinion, I think it would be unlikely that any of the panels won't pay back their energy and material inputs. You can use money as a simple gauge of the energy inputs and thus energy payback timescales, because energy has an associated cost (see: Embodied Energy and Economic Evaluation; Costanza, 1980), but just be aware that excessive costs associated with toxic or scarce materials can skew that figure (e.g. beryllium, neodymium). If you used the 25 year cost-payback time I think you'd probably be looking at the very maximum amount of time it would take to repay its energy 'cost'. The reality is I think it will be a lot shorter timeframe than that, even in this country with our climate.
So can anyone explain if these companies offering to fit the panels for free etc is a good deal or not?
My other half is talking to a company at the moment about doing this, and I'm wondering if anyone here's already gone down this route?
My other half is talking to a company at the moment about doing this, and I'm wondering if anyone here's already gone down this route?
Associate
I'm guessing you get free electricity when it produces?
If so basically your renting your roof out to them. Personally I wouldn't. They get the Feed in Tariff and you get the chicken feed. What happens if you want to sell your house.
Buy your own panels instead and be quick about it.
The government lost their appeal and until the start of March you can get 43p per kwh produced. A pretty good return for the 8.5k it would cost.
Associate
No you won't.
I cant see people benefiting by a great deal with the free solar panels. I have a 3.84Kw system that I own and during this time of year with the sun low in the sky I am lucky if I generating 1kw midday.
You also have to change your usage patterns. Don't forget that a lot of your electricity usage will be on an evening when the sun has gone down. Things like lights, TV, PC etc.
I am fortunate to work at home so can do the washing, dishwasher during the day. So if you work away from home all day you are not going to get the benefit tbh.
You also have to change your usage patterns. Don't forget that a lot of your electricity usage will be on an evening when the sun has gone down. Things like lights, TV, PC etc.
I am fortunate to work at home so can do the washing, dishwasher during the day. So if you work away from home all day you are not going to get the benefit tbh.
But if it costs £8.5K to put these things up, it's going to take tens of years to recoup that surely? So long that's it not worth the initial dent in what could be paying of your mortgage?
And does that 11K include if it was instead working against your mortgage for example?
There's also some risks surely?
1) You're assuming your 'pay back' remains the same? What if you start getting less for some reason?
2) If you happen to move in the next 5yrs?
Given the two schemes, does anyone have any advice then?
1) Where you buy it outright completely?
2) Where the solar company fits it for free?