Solar panels damage guttering

vinr

We had ASG solar panels fitted on Jan 5 2011. Absolutely no problems with only light snow flurries over the last 2years. The latest fall of snow at around 6 inches did not sit on the tiled roof but slid off onto the guttering and dragged the upvc cladding and guttering away from the roof anchoring points. The last heavy fall of snow had occurred In November 2010 (18 inches) before the panels were fitted and caused no problem whatsoever to the guttering as the snow was held on the roof tiles and melted away gradually.

I emailed ASG advising them of this issue and received the following reply:

"Thankyou for your email. Unfortunately we can’t do anything about the snow in theguttering as it does happen to other people without Solar Panels."

So I need to look into this further and would assume that there are others who have experienced the same problem with roofs like mine with a rake angle of 30 degrees or more. There are several other properties in my area with solar panels but their roofs are less steep and the panels end several feet well before the guttering that acts as a brake and allows the snow to be held by the roof tiles and melt away slowly.



Regards

Vin

penrhyn

It used to be fairly common to fit snow guards to roofs where there was a glass conservatory below. You probably need something like that.
http://www.roofingsuperstore.co.uk/product/roofing-accessories/snow-guards/tile-snow-guards/klober-trapac-tile-snow-guard-3m.html

vinr

penrhyn wrote: »

It used to be fairly common to fit snow guards to roofs where there was a glass conservatory below. You probably need something like that.
http://www.roofingsuperstore.co.uk/product/roofing-accessories/snow-guards/tile-snow-guards/klober-trapac-tile-snow-guard-3m.html

Thanks penrhyn, these panels belong to ASG on a roof rental scheme over a contract term of 25 years so would have thought that as the damage has been caused by the 'viscosity' of the self-clean panel surfaces there is some liability there to support my dilemma. I will have to investigate further and was just hoping that there may have been other users on this forum that could have been similarly affected as thousands of homes now have these panels fitted.

chanz4

They could hide behind act of god

vinr

maybe chanz4 they will, but this possibility would have been discussed during their risk assessment when looking at roof rake angles. I'm just hoping that A Shade Greener will come forward with an answer and financial help on fitting snow guards but even this may not be possible as the panels just come short of the roof edge. Plus the fact that holding back snow on the panels will reduce their potential contibuting to a loss by ASG in reduced payment for unused power going into the National Grid.

Ashadegreener_representative

vinr wrote: »

maybe chanz4 they will, but this possibility would have been discussed during their risk assessment when looking at roof rake angles. I'm just hoping that A Shade Greener will come forward with an answer and financial help on fitting snow guards but even this may not be possible as the panels just come short of the roof edge. Plus the fact that holding back snow on the panels will reduce their potential contibuting to a loss by ASG in reduced payment for unused power going into the National Grid.

Hi,

Snow damage is a common occurrence on properties without solar panels on them. It is likely that the guttering itself is either unsuitable for the conditions or is not securely fitted to the property.

A quick search on Google for 'snow damaged guttering' shows numerous different threads on various forums regarding how snow damaged their gutters but none have mentioned solar panels as a factor.

undaunted

If you'd not had solar panels what do you think would have happened to the snow?

To show any liability against the panel owner I think you'd have to be able to show that it would somehow have landed in your gutters differently / drained away more slowly rather than fell onto the gutters or whatever.

With respect I don't think they are being unreasonable here personally - it's surely more likely that your guttering was two years older than the last snow fall, wear and tare happens, the snow fall wasn't identical to the last one etc etc. You have more chance of making an insurance claim than the panel owner being found liable I suspect - and even they probably will claim it's an "act of god" and they aren't liable either!