new solar panels

Siberianski

hi we had a guy knock upon our door from a company called a shade of greener. They have offered us free solar panels, no install costs etc and i am wondering if anyone has had dealings with the company???

A neighbour has them in from the same company and he says his electric bill have reduced by around a quarter pm and he has managed to cut his gas bill by a third too.

We were thinking of doing the same but i dont know if this will be possible. The guy up the road says he uses a water heater/tank with an immersion heater attached to it and mid morning he puts the water immersion heater on for 2hours. This he states fulfills his water needs for showers/baths/washing dishes etc.

Do anyone know what the cost would be for us to get this fitted approximately. I have currently a combi boiler in a baxi thats three-four year old. I think from memory its b rated, our gas bills are around 50-60pm and our electric bill is 30-40.

I work from home during the day and having three kids hammers the bills up through the room as the washer is continually on, or heating etc.

Seanymph

Do you own your house?

Solar panels come in two sorts - one sort generates electricity (that your friend has, he uses this electricity to power his immersion) and one sort heats water directly. To use the sort that generates electricity nothing about your system changes - you just use the generated electricity to power things in your house, you won't even notice the difference.

The sort this company are talking about generate electricity.

You can pay for them to be installed, then own them. Or people install them for nothing - you get the free electricity, but they own them.

The benefit of owning them is that the government pays an 'allowance' for the electricity they generate - I don't know what it is at the moment, and it depends on the size of the system, but it's around 40p per kilowatt for me.

So, you have them on your roof and whilst it is generating you don't draw your power from the grid through your meter, you use the free stuff from the roof - so you save money on your electricity bill.

Then, quarterly, you submit what you generated and you get a cheque from the government for what was produced on your roof.

If you let them install them for nothing you only get the benefit of using the power, not the cheque - and from what I am reading you can have problems then selling your house on because you have 'rented out' the space above your house for about 25 years - you also could face problems if there is a mechanical/technical problem with them. they obviously are doing it for the money.

If you pay for the install then you get the free electricity and the payment - double bonus - and it's less problem when you sell, but it's still new so I'm watching it.

We have a system we paid to install, it does save electricity, and I get money quarterly - but not as much as they predicted. Although the last week or so has been lovely watching it clocking up!

Siberianski

Yeah we own our place. It's an ex local authority property but its ours with a mortgage. I would love to be in the position to buy the panels but at the moment it is no financially viable.

macman

Solar PV panels cannot possibly reduce your gas bills. That would require solar water heating.
A combi is not generally suitable for solar hot water, as you have no hot tank to store the hot water produced.

Cardew

Siberianski wrote: »

hi we had a guy knock upon our door from a company called a shade of greener.

I suspect the firm are called A Shade Greener.

http://ashadegreener.co.uk/

They are one of the biggest firms in the 'Rent a Roof' business. They fit the panels for free.

Although personally I think the scheme is very poor value for house owners, A Shade Greener(if it is the same firm) are apparently one of the better firms and there are literally hundreds of posts on MSE about the scheme and that particular firm.

With a combi you are not going to save on gas.The predictions for annual savings on electricity tend to be exagerated, but between £50 and £100 a year seems to be a ball-park figure. IIRC WHICH suggested £70 pa. Most of the savings in the summer months.

The downside is you have to grant the company a 25 year lease(20 years now?) on your house and if you want to sell the house the prospective owner has to agree that lease.

There are plenty of reports that having panels make getting a mortgage difficult, and although A Shade Greener give an assurance that their lease is legally acceptable, it does't mean a mortgage company are bound to accept that lease.

jackieblack

macman wrote: »

Solar PV panels cannot possibly reduce your gas bills.

Not directly.
But if you normally heat your water with a gas boiler, and during good weather you turn this off and use the immersion to heat your water using the electricity being produced by the PV system, you can save money on your gas bill.
We do

Cardew

jackieblack wrote: »

Not directly.
But if you normally heat your water with a gas boiler, and during good weather you turn this off and use the immersion to heat your water using the electricity being produced by the PV system, you can save money on your gas bill.
We do

The OP stated:

I have currently a combi boiler

So is unlikely to have a Hot Water tank or an Immersion heater!

Also as discussed in several threads using the immersion heater instead of gas is likely to cost money, instead of saving, unless you have a 'spare' 2kW of solar generated power.

macman

Exactly. And even if you did have a conventional boiler and a immersion heater, why would you turn off a gas boiler in the summer and use an immersion heater instead, when the kWh cost is approximately 300% higher?
The average solar PV system is not going to power an immersion heater element-most of the load will come from the grid.

WestonDave

If you have an immersion heater in a tank its possible to change the element to a lower power one and set it up via a controller so that when there is spare solar power, it slowly heats the water in the tank, so its possible but academic due to the OP almost certainly not having a tank!

These rent a roof schemes generally save a minimal amount for the householder - I'd be surprised if it was over £10-£15 per month on this situation, but on the other hand you get someone's panels fixed to your roof with no means of telling them to take them away until the 25 years is up.

If you have money to invest in your own panels you can still make good returns via the Feed in Tariffs, but not convinced about rent a roof as the odds seem stacked towards the company using your roof for free to make money for themselves.

jackieblack

The OP stated:

Siberianski wrote: »

A neighbour has them in from the same company and he says his electric bill have reduced by around a quarter pm and he has managed to cut his gas bill by a third too.

and then

macman wrote: »

Solar PV panels cannot possibly reduce your gas bills.

Maybe not for the OP, but for his neighbour it IS possible he has cut the gas bill.

Cardew wrote: »

Also as discussed in several threads using the immersion heater instead of gas is likely to cost money, instead of saving

But, in those circumstances, the gas bill would be reduced, (even if, as a result, the electric bill isn't reduced by as much as it otherwise would be)

Cardew wrote: »

unless you have a 'spare' 2kW of solar generated power.

So, it is entirely possible, depending on the size of the pv system and what other appliances are in use at the same time

gc_bus

Not sure if I'd bother again to have solar PV panels fitted. We had a 1.7KwP system fitted just under seven years ago. In those days you got a grant for about 50% of their cost. We now get, under the FITS system 3.4p/Kwh export and around 9.4p/Kwh for everything that is generated including that used on site. The Kwh payments were much higher for us before FITS was introduced (about 34.5 p/Kwh) but FITS changed all that for early adopters in favour of new installations. Based on that and the initial purchase price/install after the 50% grant then it's going to take around 25 years payback period. Of course during that time electricity costs will continue on average to rise so the payback period will shorten. Fingers crossed that my inverter lasts that long :-) So think long and hard before installing solar PV - governments can and do change things!