Soldato
Solar panels and battery - any real world reccomendations?
- Thread starter GinG
- Start date
Man of Honour
I do because I might as well. My battery is full by 9am from May onwards so I use 0 gas from May. I just use electric heaters for the house from mid April. So for at least half the year I heat my house with electricity and the hot water from excess solar. The installation cost was tiny Vs the whole cost of the solar installation it felt like a no brainer.
It's not about ROI for me it's about reducing my reliance on gas as much as possible. If I make some cash great, but that's not the driver for me. Why use gas when I don't have to?
You’ll reduce your carbon footprint more by exporting because you’ll be displacing fossil fuels from the grid.
Burning gas in your boiler to produce heat is usually more efficient than burning gas to make electricity and pumping it down transmission lines. Less gas is burnt overall.
As others have said, you’ll also get a better return.
Burning gas in your boiler to produce heat is usually more efficient than burning gas to make electricity and pumping it down transmission lines. Less gas is burnt overall.
As others have said, you’ll also get a better return.
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Soldato
Yeah right now the vast majority of the time exporting is reducing gas produced electricity. Occasionally not, in both directions (either gas not being burned, or you could be offsetting something worse)
Over time though that potentially reduces as we get more and more renewables.
I get free power ups as they simply cannot export enough electricity from the area.
At those times then if I export and use gas later to heat water it is genuinely adding to gas usage.
Over time though that potentially reduces as we get more and more renewables.
I get free power ups as they simply cannot export enough electricity from the area.
At those times then if I export and use gas later to heat water it is genuinely adding to gas usage.
Man of Honour
From my usage and my calculations it's marginal and I'm better off using the immersion heater.
We're all in this to reduce our bills and use less natural resources so it's win win regardless.
We're all in this to reduce our bills and use less natural resources so it's win win regardless.
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I'm based in north Hampshire and currently have a solar system that was installed in 2017 (under the old FITs "generation based" scheme). It's producing on average 3200kWh a year, but it's only putting a small dent in my electric consumption (~17,000 kWh a year). My baseline consumption at night is 1.4kWh (with all the lights off and everyone in bed).
As battery prices have fallen through the floor - I'm looking at building 31kWh or 47kWh of battery storage using DIY kits (Seplos or similar).
I'm also considering (and am in the process of getting quotes) putting ~5kWh worth of solar panels on the garage (pitched) roof. This is partially shaded during the day, but the current solar panel technology should exceed the generation I have on the house roof (which is 3 stories high). The existing system will be left "as is".
The question is - how do I find a solar installer that will be prepared to play ball with with my own battery storage system? I suppose can get them to quote an install with a hybrid inverter, but that still leaves a gap with the GEN and DNO paperwork to include the battery electrics.
Has anyone been down a similar route? I'm guessing I need to find a sparky that is savvy in renewable energy solutions.
As battery prices have fallen through the floor - I'm looking at building 31kWh or 47kWh of battery storage using DIY kits (Seplos or similar).
I'm also considering (and am in the process of getting quotes) putting ~5kWh worth of solar panels on the garage (pitched) roof. This is partially shaded during the day, but the current solar panel technology should exceed the generation I have on the house roof (which is 3 stories high). The existing system will be left "as is".
The question is - how do I find a solar installer that will be prepared to play ball with with my own battery storage system? I suppose can get them to quote an install with a hybrid inverter, but that still leaves a gap with the GEN and DNO paperwork to include the battery electrics.
Has anyone been down a similar route? I'm guessing I need to find a sparky that is savvy in renewable energy solutions.
Soldato
Crack house lol
Soldato
As long as it's a DC connected battery the DNO is not interested, if you installed an AC connected battery then it would have an additional inverter and thus more export capacity.
Either find a willing sparky, which is difficult and the path I went down (see my signature) or get a solar installer to install an appropriate hybrid inverter that can use a 48v battery system. Then take a look at what Fogstar has to offer.
So what are running that uses so much power????
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As I want to use the battery storage as a backup for power outages (and hopefully get rid of the UPS units in the house), I believe a hybrid inverter will be required. Probably one rated for at least 8kWh. I'm with you on trying to find a solar installer that will work with me, rather than trying to sell one of their "canned" systems.
It is indeed the Fogstar kit I'm looking at.
The hot tub is not included in the 1.4kWh night time figure (in fact it's switched off at the moment - it was costing £120/mth to run with the sky high tariffs).
Still checking the figures outbut I've estimated the following at the moment (running 24/7) :
| Network switches | 317w |
| Unifi APs | 93w |
| Server/NAS | 270w |
| Cameras | 91w |
| Cooling fans | 60w |
| TOTAL | 831w |
Will shortly be installing an energy monitor into the consumer unit along with some smart plugs to figure out where the other 570w is going!
Soldato
@darkblade i fitted a 8kW Victron Quattro and routed my incoming grid connection through it, thus giving me whole house back up. If using a more conventional hybrid inverter you'll need a gateway as well.
Something is off with your baseload, I have a server with well over 300TB of storage (Chia) and a 3060 GPU in constant use, 10Gb and 1Gb switches, two WiFi access points, two fridge freezers and our base load is around 600 watts.
PS I pretty quickly gave up on a solar installer that would work with me and got lucky finding a sparky that was branching out into solar.
Something is off with your baseload, I have a server with well over 300TB of storage (Chia) and a 3060 GPU in constant use, 10Gb and 1Gb switches, two WiFi access points, two fridge freezers and our base load is around 600 watts.
PS I pretty quickly gave up on a solar installer that would work with me and got lucky finding a sparky that was branching out into solar.
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Yeh, some equipment consolidation may be worth the investment if your consumption/rationalisation genuinely is that high.
I’m only using around 7000-8000kwh and I’m fully electric. I’ve got a heat pump, EV and no gas. I’d be considered a heavy user. A normal fuel fuel customer with an ICE car would be 3200-3500kwh
170000 kWh/year is a hell of a lot of energy.
Are you 3-phase or single phase?
As @Ron-ski set out, you have to go down the route he did or use an off the shelf product from the likes of GivEnergy or Tesla which includes a gateway.
If you have 3 phase and deep pockets, I recently saw a video of someone installing one of these:
www.sigenergy.com
I’m only using around 7000-8000kwh and I’m fully electric. I’ve got a heat pump, EV and no gas. I’d be considered a heavy user. A normal fuel fuel customer with an ICE car would be 3200-3500kwh
170000 kWh/year is a hell of a lot of energy.
Are you 3-phase or single phase?
As @Ron-ski set out, you have to go down the route he did or use an off the shelf product from the likes of GivEnergy or Tesla which includes a gateway.
If you have 3 phase and deep pockets, I recently saw a video of someone installing one of these:
Energy Storage System | 5-in-one Home ESS | Sigenergy
Revolutionize your energy solutions with Sigenergy cutting-edge 5-in-one solar charger inverter and energy storage system. Enjoy efficient, sustainable power.
Soldato
It was an impressive system (and house) they installed in that video, well there are two videos, one for the solar installation and one for the battery, but I don't know how much control you get. Anyone using Artisan Electricians certainly needs deep pockets (that house owner clealy did) as it states solar installs from £20k on their website.
I did a quick search online and it seems the 8kwh battery modules are ~£3k (+VAT) each.
I’ve got no idea how much the full kit cost with the gateway, inverter and all the fittings, probably £lol. Either way that system had £18k of batteries in it alone.
Given its artisan, I’d probably go out on a limb and say there was at least £70k on the invoice.
I’ve got no idea how much the full kit cost with the gateway, inverter and all the fittings, probably £lol. Either way that system had £18k of batteries in it alone.
Given its artisan, I’d probably go out on a limb and say there was at least £70k on the invoice.
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I remember watching some of their installations a while ago and then it got to the price.........
Obviously found a niche with expensive installs, likely because of the YouTube videos (and seems very knowledgeable) but this seems to be pricing on a grand scale for the rich and famous!
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Soldato
But what you may have also missed is that the manufacturer of the battery system sponsored the video, I wonder if the customer got a discount considering they may watch the video.
I saw that but I don’t think it would have been material, I’d expect artisan would have pocketed that as YouTube profit.
The customers looked like they were made of money and could afford it either way. That plant room was bigger than many Londoners flats!
The customers looked like they were made of money and could afford it either way. That plant room was bigger than many Londoners flats!
Just standard single phase. I'm on gas for heating and hot water, no EV, but even with the hot tub and 10GB network, something seems off (or rather, VERY on!) - hence why I'm installing energy monitors to track down greedy kit.
This is the house rack right now (need to order a longer DAC cable for the poe switch!). Looking into moving some of the RJ45 links over to fiber and losing the Netgear 10gb switch.
Soldato
im a very low energy user and my overnight base load is 80wh's.......but yours does seem overly high, even for others listed on hereJust standard single phase. I'm on gas for heating and hot water, no EV, but even with the hot tub and 10GB network, something seems off (or rather, VERY on!) - hence why I'm installing energy monitors to track down greedy kit.
This is the house rack right now (need to order a longer DAC cable for the poe switch!). Looking into moving some of the RJ45 links over to fiber and losing the Netgear 10gb switch.