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Solar PV Ordered!

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  • jollyme
    jollyme Posts: 343 Forumite
    In the last 6weeks I have had 3 installers visit to provide quotes for solar PV on my East South East roof. Well, what has totally left me puzzled now is that the third has declined to quote stating that trees will provide shade at various times of the day/year. Both of the other two installers looked at the trees and height etc etc and stated that they did not believe there to be a problem. How do I know who is giving me the actual situation?? this is a lot of money I would be spending and then if there is shade?!?! What are your thoughts folks?
  • Sharon1985
    Sharon1985 Posts: 16 Forumite
    jollyme wrote: »
    In the last 6weeks I have had 3 installers visit to provide quotes for solar PV on my East South East roof. Well, what has totally left me puzzled now is that the third has declined to quote stating that trees will provide shade at various times of the day/year. Both of the other two installers looked at the trees and height etc etc and stated that they did not believe there to be a problem. How do I know who is giving me the actual situation?? this is a lot of money I would be spending and then if there is shade?!?! What are your thoughts folks?


    You could try micro inverters - I looked into them before I had my system fitted
  • jetski690
    jetski690 Posts: 276 Forumite
    jollyme wrote: »
    In the last 6weeks I have had 3 installers visit to provide quotes for solar PV on my East South East roof. Well, what has totally left me puzzled now is that the third has declined to quote stating that trees will provide shade at various times of the day/year. Both of the other two installers looked at the trees and height etc etc and stated that they did not believe there to be a problem. How do I know who is giving me the actual situation?? this is a lot of money I would be spending and then if there is shade?!?! What are your thoughts folks?

    I'm no expert but have looked into having a solar pv system install, I too have a bit of shading by a monkey puzzle next to my bungalow and what many of them dont tell you or they might not even know themselves is if one panel is in the shade it brings the whole array down with it, but as has been said each panel can have it's own micro inverter to which that would not happen, it probably will add to cost but for me it seem's the way to go. I've also had three different company's quote and only one of those used a handheld device that picked up the sun and gave him valueable info, you've got to remember most of these salesmen are going to tell you your suitable as their after a sale the third who wouldn't quote I'd feel more inclined to believe as his got nothing to gain by telling you that. Can you not look at the roof whilst the sun goes round to see how much shading the trees cause ? or could you even possibly lop or cut the tree's down.
  • jollyme
    jollyme Posts: 343 Forumite
    I take your point that nothing would be gained by not quoting and I could believe that there may be shading from the trees within any payback period but the trees are all on our land and we would be more than happy to lopp them or even remove one of the three that are mentioned. I have looked at various times of the day and am not convinced by the statement being made - of course I cannot say what it would be like in the autumn etc. I just wonder if there is any recourse if I use one of the companys who actually said that we had no shading problem with the trees after they have looked at it
  • zeupater
    zeupater Posts: 5,389 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    jollyme wrote: »
    I take your point that nothing would be gained by not quoting and I could believe that there may be shading from the trees within any payback period but the trees are all on our land and we would be more than happy to lopp them or even remove one of the three that are mentioned. I have looked at various times of the day and am not convinced by the statement being made - of course I cannot say what it would be like in the autumn etc. I just wonder if there is any recourse if I use one of the companys who actually said that we had no shading problem with the trees after they have looked at it
    Hi

    If you feed your information into the PVGIS calculator (http://re.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pvgis/apps4/pvest.php) and select the show graphs&horizon options you can generate a representation of the sun-arc which can be used to guestimate your shade losses. You'll need to take relative heights of your roof and trees into consideration, so a little trigonometry will be needed ;)

    HTH
    Z
    "We are what we repeatedly do, excellence then is not an act, but a habit. " ...... Aristotle
    B)
  • Sharon1985
    Sharon1985 Posts: 16 Forumite
    I forgot to mention Micro inverters also have a 20 warranty. but these are for propertys with shading issues , multiple panels at diffrent directions , or little room for an standard inverter . I had none of these issues so i went for the sma 4000tl
  • Hi All,

    I have just ordered a 2.365kw system, and have a question regarding the FIT payments.

    My current energy provider is British Gas, but I have heard that they are not the best of payers so I was considering signing up with Eon. My question is regarding what I have to inform British Gas, seeing as my electricty usage should drop by quite a bit as my meter should run backwards during the day and forwards at night.

    Any thoughts?
  • Doc_N
    Doc_N Posts: 8,543 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Photogenic
    Tanman1973 wrote: »
    Hi All,

    I have just ordered a 2.365kw system, and have a question regarding the FIT payments.

    My current energy provider is British Gas, but I have heard that they are not the best of payers so I was considering signing up with Eon. My question is regarding what I have to inform British Gas, seeing as my electricty usage should drop by quite a bit as my meter should run backwards during the day and forwards at night.

    Any thoughts?

    I've certainly had no problems with e.on and FIT payments. The system they operate works pretty well.

    As to British Gas, you only need tell them if you want an immediate reduction in your monthly direct debit payment, though this will sort itself out in due course anyway.

    Meter running backwards? Energy providers don't like that at all - they'll deal with it and stop it as soon as they know!
  • SpudSpud
    SpudSpud Posts: 15 Forumite
    BobA wrote: »
    I am new member to the forum and looking for some advice.

    I had a 3.96kWp system installed in March with a Diehl Ako 3800s Inverter in my loft. The system has been working well with all this great sunny weather, BUT, I am being woken up nearly every morning by the constant buzz of the inverter which is a few feet directly above my head in the loft.

    I have tried to research Inverter noise and there dosnt seem to be much information - and my supplier has said they have installed 20 other installtions without anybody complaining about the Inverter noise.

    I came across an Australian web forum (link removed as "Sorry as a new user you are not allowed to post with links.",
    but have seen nothing posted on UK sites.

    Does anybody on this forum have solar Inverters in their loft and suffer from 'Inverter noise' ?

    I have to get it fixed as it is causing me to wake at 5am each morning!
    Hi BOBA

    Sorry for the late reply

    Yes there is a problem as it sounds as if they have attached the inverter direct to the the Breeze block/brick wall which is all well and good but if you have made a complaint then it should be investigated.

    the problem is the inverter buzzing is travelling down the wall making it sound louder than it actually is, the best method to resove this is to move it between the rafters using uni strut or a large MDF board this will reduce the overall noise.

    the problem with the Diehl is they are actually a converted inverter used in industry so very reliable but very heavy at the same time.

    my other concern is that you said you have a 3.98Kw system, how is that possible? 3.7 is about the max on the DC side you can install.
    Phone your DNO's new connection department and ask if the system has been notified of connection if not you might be told to make an immediate disconnection.

    In your handover information pack you should have been given a copy of your G83/1 application with circuit diagram and disconnection procedure if you do not have it call whoever supplied your system and ask them to email to you by the end of the working day,(PDF) if they cant then i'd smell a rat and phone their MCS accreditor and get their complaint procedure underway.

    Any more questions just ask
  • celerity
    celerity Posts: 311 Forumite
    zeupater wrote: »
    Hi

    If you feed your information into the PVGIS calculator (http://re.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pvgis/apps4/pvest.php) and select the show graphs&horizon options you can generate a representation of the sun-arc which can be used to guestimate your shade losses. You'll need to take relative heights of your roof and trees into consideration, so a little trigonometry will be needed ;)

    Another option that is worth mentioning is to model your house and roof in Google Sketchup, and then geolocate it in Google Earth (basically take your model and overlay it at ground height using a satellite map from Google Earth).
    Then, you can add some tree objects in the correct place (you'll need to either measure the heights or make a best guess) and plot the shadows from the sun at any time of the day, for any day in history (or the future). [all of this is still done in Sketchup by the way, not Google Earth]

    It sounds complicated, but the only difficult thing is the modelling of your house, as there is a learning curve associated with any CAD software.

    My installers (Cambridge Solar) actually did this process for me and then sent me the Sketchup file so I could play with it. I found it really helpful in deciding on the configuration of my panels. I didn't have any trees to contend with, but we have vague ideas of getting an extension in the future, so the computer modelling really helped us plan for that eventuality. Once it is set up you can just enter a date and then drag a slider to move the sun (and shadows) around your roof, it's great!

    /\dam
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