Renewables: "talking 'bout my generation"

jackieblack

A reasonable day here weatherwise today, but only 7 kWh generated. Felt like more of an 8 or 9 day, (after 3 1/2 years I can usually guess pretty accurately and am rarely surprised) but I gues this is a result of the high pollution levels reducing the clarity of the light (for want of a better expression )?

zeupater

jackieblack wrote: »

A reasonable day here weatherwise today, but only 7 kWh generated. Felt like more of an 8 or 9 day, (after 3 1/2 years I can usually guess pretty accurately and am rarely surprised) but I gues this is a result of the high pollution levels reducing the clarity of the light (for want of a better expression )?

Hi

Did some pottering around in the greenhouse today (as you do) and noticed that it's probably got more dust on it than the back of the telly in the bedroom .... . Needs a pretty good downpour soon to allow the sun to get through to both the silicon wafers and the cuttings!

Z

Dodo0808

Oh dear......

My results for the last few days make for sad reading:-

Tues = 13.4
Wed = 5.2
Today = 2.7

I wish I could say these were O's, but alas these are kWh's:

I hope this smog/fog clears off soon.

groovyf

...and I thought yesterday was bad! A whopping 1.89kWh today. The heavy fog/mist/cloud is meant to be moving onwards tomorrow. I hope so!

legoman62

Groundhog day here, only made 0.975 O's but....a chance on Sunday of some decent weather. Pleeeease:T

Oscargrouch

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Hello folk, looking for some help, which is generation based ... sort of.

I'm just doing some housekeeping on the PV FAQ, and I'm not happy with the estimated leccy savings figure:

Firstly I usually suggest £120 (not £100) so ...... oops!

Thanks.

Mart.

Hi Mart,

Just a quick reply; more to come later. Firstly, I think that the savings should be expressed, in this instance, as percentage savings ( as the gen rate is) to try and use numbers, is suicide, as you do not know what rate people are on.

Oscargrouch

1.36 O's ....

jackieblack

Ok, so my 7 kWh (3.15 Os) wasn't so bad after all then

Martyn1981

Oscargrouch wrote: »

Hi Mart,

Just a quick reply; more to come later. Firstly, I think that the savings should be expressed, in this instance, as percentage savings ( as the gen rate is) to try and use numbers, is suicide, as you do not know what rate people are on.

Hi Oscar, I know where you're coming from, but since the FAQ thread is aimed at the initial stage of considering PV, I really think a general statement is needed. Also the paragraph does conclude with the catch-all:

Larger savings are possible, but will require higher daytime consumption.

tunnel wrote: »

Hi Mart,

We are high users, the wife canes it everytime the sun pokes its head out. I'd like to think my "savings" are around £250 per annum now my Final system(yes no more room) is up and running.

Hiya T. Allowing for your large capacity and multiple arrays, that would seem to fit my thoughts, especially with higher / daytime use. Cheers.

zeupater wrote: »

Hi Mart

My thoughts are that whilst it's possible for someone who either has a high base-load or is in during the day to save an average of 3kWh/day (or more), the average household probably would struggle unless they are really serious with the use of automated diversion, timers etc.

Hiya Zeup. This is kind of the nub of my dilemma. Going back my initial install 3.58kWp ESE produced approx £150 savings. Now, generation is probably equal (annually) to about 3kWp of south facing, so probably a fair comparison to an average install.

But ..... and hard as this may be to believe, I really don't think I do much to maximise savings, nothing that anyone else, (especially if they have a washing machine and dishwasher with timers) couldn't do.

That's what got me thinking (combined with the almost unavoidable baseload savings) that 'easy(ish)' savings may be a bit more than I thought.

Up to now I've tended to err on the side of caution that understating the numbers is probably a good thing to prevent misleading anyone. However, the counter-argument (in my own head) is that 'who the hell am I' to do that, since wrongly understating may put people off that could benefit. And as adults, all potential PV'ers need to take some responsibility and consider the potential savings, hence why I choose such a wide spread in the estimate, before suggesting more is possible - headache!

zeupater wrote: »

As you mention, tiered tariffs aren't available anymore, but that should really make little difference as the tier1 differential covered the standing charge, which now must be applied as a separate line item.

I'm not sure I get this. Do you mean comparing a PV reduced bill from the two tier period to one today will be little changed?

My thought is that for a new PV'er with a bill already altered by the switch to a S/C, then they are now 'knocking off' 14/15p units from their bills, rather than the old tier2 10p units, so the savings should be greater, even if it is due to an accounting trick.


To all, apologies for this diversion from generation talk, but grateful for any approximate savings figures, as I suspect word of mouth may be the only way to improve my estimation.

Cheers.

Mart.

Martyn1981

Oscargrouch wrote: »

Hi Mart,

Just a quick reply; more to come later. Firstly, I think that the savings should be expressed, in this instance, as percentage savings ( as the gen rate is) to try and use numbers, is suicide, as you do not know what rate people are on.

Hiya Oscar (again), hope I didn't seem dismissive in my previous response, I'm not, honest.

In fact, I'm wondering if it would be a good idea to add some info on automation/diversion of leccy. Water heating is getting more popular, and devices like 'your' opti-plug add-ons are also a simple way to expand the possibilities, if folk want to go down that route.

I think section 1 of the FAQ is getting a bit heavy and overcrowded, but perhaps an expansion of section 3 (which already mentions water heating) is needed.

Now for the cheeky part, any chance of a short and basic explanation of what your kit does that (couple of paragraphs) I could add in, please? Are there other kits like that that I could also mention?

Thanks.

BTW @ all. I'm hoping that the FAQ thread is still useful, the number of reads is high, but not sure if the change to the 'sticky policy' means that it's not being seen by as many now. Perhaps I'll just bump it every month when there's been no activity.

Mart.