Cold called re free solar panels.

Martyn1981

rogerblack wrote: »

Cause carbon reduction for the lowest price possible.
This is short-circuited by people using devices to utilise all of their generated electricity, and for example swapping gas for electricity. They are being paid to generate carbon-saving electricity. This makes the internally used units _very_ highly subsidised for their carbon use.

Sorry Roger, last thoughts, for the day.

I'm not trying to support diversion switches, but I think this is a very complicated issue. Most easily solved with metered export, and a higher export tariff to reflect leccy on site, with no distribution losses.

However, till then, whilst I appreciate that gas off-set works against CO2 savings, some users will instead be off-setting leccy, and some oil or LPG, which presumably further complicates the issues with CO2 emissions from the delivery vehicles.

At this stage my head started to hurt.

Mart.

[Deleted User]

What cheeses me off is the continual harping on from people on mains gas. Not just in there endless whinging about how expensive gas bills are... how expensive a new boiler is...when to change it...how if you have gas an ASHP is not for you... isn't awful heating water with pv when you could be burning gas...

Well guess what millions of are not on the gas grid. Gas is cheap... gas boilers are cheap so change it when you need to... ASHPs are not for people on the gas grid... diverting pv energy is no different to diverting it to the telly or ASHP... burning gas when you have pv and the option of an Immersun etc is frankly stupid idea of the century...

And what if there are no neighbors to export to? As I understand it pv generated electricity can not go back through a transformer so is wasted if not used? Backwards running meter... hear about them but met nobody that has one... wish I had one tho... save the cost of an immersun

Before FITs was introduced I'm sure the fine details were hammered out by those we elected so lets just embrace it and enjoy it

Emisions are for govts to worry about and legislate accordingly. Not me. But thanks to legislation I have the option to lead a 'greener/cheaper' life thanks to FITs/RHPP/RHI/Insulation and energy efficient products such as lighting.

PV and the poor - This really really cheeses me off as I understand that Income tax raised in this country does not cover the benefits bill. Sorry but who really is having the last laugh here???

Just adding to the endless noise on the pv threads...

EricMears

jeepjunkie wrote: »

What cheeses me off is the continual harping on from people on mains gas ....

Well guess what millions of are not on the gas grid.

Second that ! In our case we're using oil to heat water most of the time and that's a lot dearer than gas

jeepjunkie wrote: »

As I understand it pv generated electricity can not go back through a transformer so is wasted if not used?

Not convinced that's correct. A simple transformer ought to work equally well in either direction (though of course there may be some inbuilt circuitry added to prevent that in practice ?)

Martyn1981

EricMears wrote: »

Not convinced that's correct. A simple transformer ought to work equally well in either direction (though of course there may be some inbuilt circuitry added to prevent that in practice ?)

I don't pretend to know this in any detail, but I think it's the transformers in the local sub-stations that can't go backwards.

Mart.

EricMears

Martyn1981 wrote: »

I don't pretend to know this in any detail, but I think it's the transformers in the local sub-stations that can't go backwards.

Mart.

Where are our grid experts when you need them ?

[Deleted User]

jeepjunkie wrote: »

What cheeses me off is the continual harping on from people on mains gas. Not just in there endless whinging about how expensive gas bills are... how expensive a new boiler is...when to change it...how if you have gas an ASHP is not for you... isn't awful heating water with pv when you could be burning gas...

Well guess what millions of are not on the gas grid. Gas is cheap... gas boilers are cheap so change it when you need to... ASHPs are not for people on the gas grid... diverting pv energy is no different to diverting it to the telly or ASHP... burning gas when you have pv and the option of an Immersun etc is frankly stupid idea of the century...

And what if there are no neighbors to export to? As I understand it pv generated electricity can not go back through a transformer so is wasted if not used? Backwards running meter... hear about them but met nobody that has one... wish I had one tho... save the cost of an immersun

Before FITs was introduced I'm sure the fine details were hammered out by those we elected so lets just embrace it and enjoy it

Emisions are for govts to worry about and legislate accordingly. Not me. But thanks to legislation I have the option to lead a 'greener/cheaper' life thanks to FITs/RHPP/RHI/Insulation and energy efficient products such as lighting.

PV and the poor - This really really cheeses me off as I understand that Income tax raised in this country does not cover the benefits bill. Sorry but who really is having the last laugh here???

Just adding to the endless noise on the pv threads...

Sorry about my rant...

Cheers

silverwhistle

Martyn1981 wrote: »

I'm not trying to support diversion switches, but I think this is a very complicated issue. Most easily solved with metered export, and a higher export tariff to reflect leccy on site, with no distribution losses.

At this stage my head started to hurt.

I cam across this thread as I was looking for information on diverting generated electricity for own use. I left the last bit of the quote in as it seemed an appropriate summary...

Where to start? I'm moving back to the UK this summer and hope to get PV installed. I've enough for a small system in a cash ISA which has an embarassingly low rate (I've been unable to move being abroad) and been losing value through inflation. Even if I could just get the same rate for all the units I could generate at the REC's retail cost to me it would make sense, and the way the subsidy has been set up that's the obvious way to go.

What have people done to use their own generated electricity, aside from water heating using a diverter? As I'm semi-retired I imagine there's plenty I could do, and I know how to set a time-switch!:-)

On the question of FITs and the poor, with respect I think that's a complete red herring. The FIT design and rates might not be the best, but the aim of the policy is fine: security of supply, employment, balance of payments, developing the industry, bringing down costs, etc. I may be getting cynical in my old age, but bringing the poor into this seems just a diversionary tactic that I've seen elsewhere from often right-wing people who don't care about green issues and even less for the poor. I'd also like to know how we define someone's poverty status. I'm certainly not poor and have enough for a system in my ISA, but my car is 12 years old, don't have a tv, and generally live within my means

As it happens social housing has often been a recipient for PV, but if people are so concerned about the 'poor' perhaps they should campaign on a more general basis for them, so that they have the additional income to cover some of the additional energy costs. They'll still have to pay nuclear de-commissioning costs, and I haven't noticed an equivalent campaign about them.

Government has many social policies, and sometimes they conflict in their impacts, but they're not completely irreconcilable

EricMears

EricMears wrote: »

Originally Posted by Martyn1981
I don't pretend to know this in any detail, but I think it's the transformers in the local sub-stations that can't go backwards.

Mart.

Where are our grid experts when you need them ?

Since this thread has been refreshed, I'm reminded that we still haven't heard from any of our 'grid experts' whether exported power can get back to the HV lines.

A thought has struck me since my last posting on the subject though. When we have scheduled power cuts around here (they're needed for line maintenance and also to prune nearby trees) I always get a note popped through my door reminding me that if I choose to use a portable generator during the outage I must ensure that it can't feed back through meter as this would endanger linesmen.

My portable generator would of course be operating at 230V and the linesmen would be working on the 11kV line beyond my local transformer. So I guess my local distribution engineers share my view that the 230V would indeed be jacked up & fed into grid lines.

silverwhistle

silverwhistle wrote: »

What have people done to use their own generated electricity, aside from water heating using a diverter? As I'm semi-retired I imagine there's plenty I could do, and I know how to set a time-switch!:-)

Belay, belay, belay. Just found another useful thread, thanks...

EricMears

[QUOTE=silverwhistle;60537771
What have people done to use their own generated electricity, aside from water heating using a diverter? [/QUOTE]

Welcome aboard silverwhistle. :hello:


Water heating is one example that's pretty straightforward to automate.

Probably the biggest benefit to SP owners comes from the ability to plan manual use of cookers, dishwashers, washing machines etc during those periods when their use would be free (or even when using a little imported electricity but majority is free).