Solar panels and battery - any real world reccomendations?

adamsleath said:
I notice a lot of battery installs in sigs here. impressive.
I've yet to buy any batteries. They seem expensive, here, but of course a no brainer when it comes to self use of power.
we have just come out of winter downunder... early spring here. so that means it is basically the opposite there your summer now entering autumn?

blessed in terms of insolation where i am at 27.5 degrees south of the equator. currently generating >50kWhours, daily. still relying on feed in tariffs and self use during daylight hours. hot water system is on a timer to only heat during the day aswell.

i can dream of some batteries.
currently drawing between 9 and 14 kWhours daily (nightly aswell obviously) from the local GRID. and utilising about 10kWhours of solar generation per day.

end of blurb
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You need to take a look at Andy's Off Grid Garage, IIRC he's not far from Brisbane, loads of options for batteries, but depends what system you have and whether you want to add another inverter for AC connected battery.

www.youtube.com

Off-Grid Garage

Taking your house, shed or garage 'off-the-grid' is a very exciting thing to do. On this channel, I share my experience and thoughts of taking my garage offline, disconnecting it from the power supply and run it solely from solar and batteries (for teaching and testing purposes). We will do a...
www.youtube.com www.youtube.com
 
So have done a fast track application to the DNO to fit a bigger inverter to my system and as i have some panel size issues. i now see that FOX do a triple mppt inverter that could fit the bill and solve my issues...... still just a string inverter as i dont think batteries is a need for me, but options still open.
 
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So I went back to spectra who would move the 6k inverter up to 7k, which would come in at £11,560.

So it’s deciding if I go for that, or the BOXT quote for £12,559 which is the same batter / panel number but an 8k inverter.

If I took a loan for 5 years to cover it. Taking worst case scenario savings, I should only be 126 quid worse off a month against my current outgoings.
 
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montymint said:
Unfortunately not - the only 0% out there I can get is through E-ON, but the value proposition of their solar is worse (13.7k for 20 panels and a 5k battery), where I can get more for my money + interest.
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Worth checking your mortgage lender quite a few are offering things.
Natwest also do a 0% loan I think for people with mortgages

Edit, assuming you have a mortgage that is!
 
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What are people's pay back in years on their systems?

We had ours installed nov 2017, 4kw system, no battery.
Cost £10k (think we were ripped off) they calculated 14year payback, said probably be about 8 to 10, but doing the tracking im doing, I've only made/saved £3600 to date.
I havent really done anything for going forward, taking into account increased FiT payments and extra energy costs.

Also nothing I can do about it, maybe we just don't use enough elec, to make the most of the savings potential.
 
Its not IMO an easy question to answer.

You need to make a decision on what you would have paid, I'm using cap.
I also include benefits from powerups, free energy sessions and saving sessions.
I certainly benefit a lot more from them than I would have been able to without solar.

My system was installed late 2022, end of Nov.
Cost was £13.6k and as of end of Aug 24 I have calculated I have benefitted from heading towards £4k benefit.
So far I have a recovery of 27.3%. Based on that I expect to be around 7 year payback.
Which is incidentally what I originally calculated, although the market has moved, (none of the three things I mention above existed when I purchased)

Unless prices plummet then I think 7-8 years remains a high probability.
 
rodders said:
What are people's pay back in years on their systems?

We had ours installed nov 2017, 4kw system, no battery.
Cost £10k (think we were ripped off) they calculated 14year payback, said probably be about 8 to 10, but doing the tracking im doing, I've only made/saved £3600 to date.
I havent really done anything for going forward, taking into account increased FiT payments and extra energy costs.

Also nothing I can do about it, maybe we just don't use enough elec, to make the most of the savings potential.
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My original system, installed in December 2015 paid back by 2021 to 2022 roughly, I did have a spreadsheet with it in, but can't find it. Our 4kWp SolarEdge system was £6600 in 2015, as you say its money spent and nothing you can do about it. I highly suspect your missing something in your calculations (did you include FITS payments), or your a very low user, but then you should be getting paid reasonable money for export. I changed my deemed export to paid export on Octopus.

montymint said:
unfortunately , I'm with lloyds
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If you have a good credit rating, get a zero% credit card, although you really do need to be on top of things finacially though, one mistake and you'll get clobbered with a lot of interest. I built up about £10k on zero% quite a few years back, just paying the £200 a month I'm down to less than half now, all interest free. I had the money to pay it off, but put it in premium bonds, so I'm actually making a bit out of it.
 
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