Solar ... In the news

QrizB

Here's an article about Germany and their million-or-so plug-in balcony solar PV systems:

https://happyeconews.com/german-balcony-solar-balconkraftwerke/

Typically these systems are self-installed and cost under £500 for an 800-watt nominal output.

The article notes:

The United Kingdom currently prohibits plug-in solar systems due to concerns about building safety regulations and aesthetics, though authorities may review these restrictions soon.

I think the UK currently has about 2 million solar PV installations, roughly one home in twelve. Looking at the colours on the PVGIS map it seems that Germany is slightly better suited for solar PV than the UK is, but even so I suspect there would be a reasonable demand for these if the relevant regulations were relaxed.

Martyn1981

Hi QrizB. Earlier this year Wifey showed me a pic of BiL's balcony in Sweden. He and the Mrs, had just installed a couple of those woven wood type wind breaks. One on one end, and one along half the front, to reduce the wind coming from that direction. I mentioned balcony / plug-n-play PV, but they'd never heard of it. And he's a bit of a tech geek, and electrical engineer. The potential for this market is huge.

Fingers crossed the UK adopts something akin to the German 800W rule soon, to allow these small systems. For ~£2k, you can already get about 2kWp of PV panels and 6kWh of bidirectional battery storage with an 800W limit on the grid side AC output. Plus they have AC side sockets capable of greater output to power specific devices. Not a bad package if you can DIY the panel install near the batteries.