Solar panels and battery - any real world reccomendations?

Foghorn Leghorn · 4 Apr 2022 at 13:45

SBo said:
Yes they have, 0 VAT on there.

This is the output of the estimate on the energy saving trust website. It doesn't factor in the battery's role:

Potential annual benefit£545
Potential CO2 saving982 kg / year
Potential fuel bill saving£433 / year
Potential payments from SEG
(at 4.1 p/kWh)£112 year
Potential lifetime benefit£13,190

What's your annual usage in kWh and is the house empty or occupied during the day?

My wife's at home in the day so we can capitalise on our generation. I've estimated we can use between 60-70% of our annual generation with solar and battery storage.
We've been generating more than we can use and potentially store since mid March.

SBo · 4 Apr 2022 at 13:50

Currently occupied during the day (new baby). Longer term hard to be sure.
Avro reckons it's 3947kWh. I wish I still had access to my Igloo Energy data which would be accurate.
I've been impressed by this calculator - https://great-home.co.uk/solar-export-guarantee-seg-calculator/ - which includes the battery effect but all modelling depends on your expectation for electrcity prices, and making sensible predictions beyond ~2-3 years is next to impossible.

Foghorn Leghorn · 4 Apr 2022 at 13:57

SBo said:
Currently occupied during the day (new baby). Longer term hard to be sure.
Avro reckons it's 3947kWh. I wish I still had access to my Igloo Energy data which would be accurate.
I've been impressed by this calculator - https://great-home.co.uk/solar-export-guarantee-seg-calculator/ - which includes the battery effect but all modelling depends on your expectation for electrcity prices, and making sensible predictions beyond ~2-3 years is next to impossible.

We use the same, 3900 kWh per year. We currently import 2400 kWh per year, with battery storage I think we can use another 1500kWh per year, total saving of £840 per year at current prices. We don't have a cylinder for hot water so with your iboost you should make a good saving on your gas bill through the year too, I've no experience with them so couldn't give an estimate unfortunately.

There's also the ability to charge from the grid overnight in the winter months is you choose an economy 7 style tariff, so a potential to save costs further.

Kill_Phil · 4 Apr 2022 at 14:01

First quote back. £12k for a 5.6k system with a 5kwh Huawei battery. Seems a little steep compared to what others are being quoted but guessing may be due to lack of availability on kit especially the givenergy batteries...

ShadowMan · 4 Apr 2022 at 14:10

Looks massively overpriced for bird protection. I had the same fitted to 14 panels and it cost me £250. The installer said during install its around £150 per box and they didn't use more than 1 box really (Had 2 delivered). Took them about an hour to fit it all in (including putting clips on) so £750 is way over the top for a way to boost their profits. Is that inverter enough for you? I assume the 3.68 is the output which means you will be capped by the inverter. I had 14 x 375 panels installed with a 6kw inverter and have seen >4kw this week. Ask about cost to increase it to a 5kw or more and it probably isn't a huge bump and won't clip the system.

Tinders · 4 Apr 2022 at 14:10

Im guessing demand will drive up the price now, bit like the ev charger game, the specialists use the demand as a bit of a cash cow.

10 year payback is feasible, i cant see myself staying somewhere longer than that, im already thinking of moving to a newer more efficient place in the next 3 years, energy savings will pay any difference in morgage costs for me

SBo · 4 Apr 2022 at 14:34

Foghorn Leghorn said:
We use the same, 3900 kWh per year. We currently import 2400 kWh per year, with battery storage I think we can use another 1500kWh per year, total saving of £840 per year at current prices. We don't have a cylinder for hot water so with your iboost you should make a good saving on your gas bill through the year too, I've no experience with them so couldn't give an estimate unfortunately.

There's also the ability to charge from the grid overnight in the winter months is you choose an economy 7 style tariff, so a potential to save costs further.

Thank you, helpful to know.

Kill_Phil said:
First quote back. £12k for a 5.6k system with a 5kwh Huawei battery. Seems a little steep compared to what others are being quoted but guessing may be due to lack of availability on kit especially the givenergy batteries...

Does it have Solar Edge? That is adding ~£2.5k to the cost of this setup.

ShadowMan said:
Looks massively overpriced for bird protection. I had the same fitted to 14 panels and it cost me £250. The installer said during install its around £150 per box and they didn't use more than 1 box really (Had 2 delivered). Took them about an hour to fit it all in (including putting clips on) so £750 is way over the top for a way to boost their profits. Is that inverter enough for you? I assume the 3.68 is the output which means you will be capped by the inverter. I had 14 x 375 panels installed with a 6kw inverter and have seen >4kw this week. Ask about cost to increase it to a 5kw or more and it probably isn't a huge bump and won't clip the system.

That is the output, capped at 3.68 rather than have to go and ask the DNO for permission for higher potential AC output which they said wasn't worth the hassle, given rarely/never would DC input from the panels get it there (the array is split over two roofs facing south and west so full output unlikely).

Kill_Phil · 4 Apr 2022 at 14:55

@SBo no I don't think so. Certainly isn't itemised but will check with the supplier

SBo · 4 Apr 2022 at 17:45

I think I am going to drop 2 of the 7 panels on my south facing roof for optics and because it will remove the issue with shading from the dormers (my west-south-west roof will remain with 7). Then I can drop the solar edge for standard string and go for a combined Solis Energy Storage 3.6KW Hybrid Inverter and bring the cost of the lot down to about £9.5k. Dropping the bird mesh at the same time. It brings the break-even forward from about 13.5 years to 10 years using this calculator (https://great-home.co.uk/solar-export-guarantee-seg-calculator/) adjusting for the reduced output of course (-739kWh/yr)

SDK^ · 4 Apr 2022 at 19:04

The solar system I’ve just agreed to is:

- 14x 390w panels
- 10.5 kWh battery
- 5kW inverter
- Eddi power diverter

£12k fully installed

Ron-ski · 4 Apr 2022 at 19:52

SBo said:
Dropping the bird mesh at the same time.

I really wouldn't do without the bird mesh, either renegotiate the price or find someone to install it whilst you have the scaffold up. We never even thought about it when our panels were installed in 2015, not even offered it. Three years later, with the mess, and the constant cooing of pigeons driving me mad, I got up there myself in a cold February and installed some. Problem solved.

@SDK^ What kit you going with, and what's the install time?

rodders · 4 Apr 2022 at 20:32

We have pigeons under ours now, so annoying. Constantlymout there scaring them off.
Hardly any room to walk around to put mesh up, so I bet they'd want to use an articulated boom £££
I don't want to pay, but the noise is sooooo annoying.

Ron-ski · 4 Apr 2022 at 20:38

rodders said:
We have pigeons under ours now, so annoying. Constantly out there scaring them off.

Scaring them off just doesn't work, I tried the hose pipe and sticks, but they just come back. Worse thing is the noise, from the second you wake up you can hear it, coo, coo, coo, coo, on and on it goes!

gpuerrilla · 4 Apr 2022 at 20:42

Plastic hawk/owl?

rodders · 4 Apr 2022 at 21:16

We've managed to scare some off, some didn't come back for a few years.
Some come back a month or so later.
I'll prob need to get some quotes to install the mesh.

saayinla · 5 Apr 2022 at 13:19

SDK^ said:
The solar system I’ve just agreed to is:

- 14x 390w panels
- 10.5 kWh battery
- 5kW inverter
- Eddi power diverter

£12k fully installed

Care to Share the name of the Company, I have gotten a few myself but not satisfied with the combination of Panels/battery .

Trina vertex 385w all black panels 14 - 5.39KW
6kw Foxess hybrid inverter 1
2.6kw Foxess Battery (10.4kw)

for £11,650

Positives
9.36KW usable @ 90% DOD
Modular easily upgradable Batteries
Bigger Inverter

Negative (for me)
Smaller Array Capacity

Vs

15x Perlight Delta 400W Total Black Mono solar panel 6KW
GivEnergy 5kW Hybrid inverter
GivEnergy 5.2kWh LiFePO4 Battery (10.4kw)

For £11,983

Positives
Bigger Array Capaicty
optimsers for 2KW east facing array

Negative (for me)
8.32KW usable @80% DOD
Not easily upgradable Batteries (Compared to Foxess)
Smaller Inverter
Not a fan of Givenergy due to the limiation on the Charge/discharge rate

I am torn between both, any suggestions or reasons to go for one over the other.

SDK^ · 5 Apr 2022 at 18:08

saayinla said:
Care to Share the name of the Company, I have gotten a few myself but not satisfied with the combination of Panels/battery .

Trina vertex 385w all black panels 14 - 5.39KW
6kw Foxess hybrid inverter 1
2.6kw Foxess Battery (10.4kw)

for £11,650

Positives
9.36KW usable @ 90% DOD
Modular easily upgradable Batteries
Bigger Inverter

Negative (for me)
Smaller Array Capacity

Vs

15x Perlight Delta 400W Total Black Mono solar panel 6KW
GivEnergy 5kW Hybrid inverter
GivEnergy 5.2kWh LiFePO4 Battery (10.4kw)

For £11,983

Positives
Bigger Array Capaicty
optimsers for 2KW east facing array

Negative (for me)
8.32KW usable @80% DOD
Not easily upgradable Batteries (Compared to Foxess)
Smaller Inverter
Not a fan of Givenergy due to the limiation on the Charge/discharge rate

I am torn between both, any suggestions or reasons to go for one over the other.

It’s a local solar electrician near me (Worcester)
I was going with GivEnergy but demand is outstripping supply. November was the estimated battery delivery timeframe.

OldKitMan · 5 Apr 2022 at 21:40

Got a quote for 8 x 390W JA Solar panels with a SolaX Power 3.68 kW inverter, so a 3.12kW system, estimated to produce 2,482 kWh per year, also comes with a 'free' EV Charger which I might see if they can take off and reduce the price as for the Solar and EV Charger fully installed it's £6,000 (needs scaffolding).

Seems expensive to me but they did come out and measure it and plan it on their system.

I've had another company estimate £6k for a 4kW system (12 panel) which seems more reasonable (no car charger but I'm not too bothered about that as there is funding available to reduce the cost of that a lot if I need one when I get an EV).

Both installs will need panels on a couple of sides of the roof as the South facing one can only take 6 due to the shape, the west facing one could take the other six but might have a bit of shading from next door as the sun gets lower.

Have asked the second company to see if they will give me a formal quote for their system as it seems good value and they are a local firm with a good rep and another member on here used them and said good things so hopefully they'll get back to me.

Ron-ski · 6 Apr 2022 at 06:45

Scaffolding shouldn't be expensive, when ours was done I organised and paid for the scaffolding, it came to £600 (Dec 2015), for two roofs, including going over our kitchen roof, and safety rails up the both gable ends of the two roofs.

If they are saying its expensive, get some quotes.

200sols · 6 Apr 2022 at 06:47

Ron-ski said:
Scaffolding shouldn't be expensive, when ours was done I organised and paid for the scaffolding, it came to £600 (Dec 2015), for two roofs, including going over our kitchen roof, and safety rails up the both gable ends of the two roofs.

If they are saying its expensive, get some quotes.

Prices are quite a bit higher now than 7 years ago.