Solar system worth it?

Bluekarter

Hi, looking into solar but kind of put off as I think the reputation of installers is a bit like double glazing, but anyway.

We have a large roof area as we live in a bungalow, roof faces East/West, so gets decent amount of sun all day.

Looking for feedback from people that have had for a while and how much kWh per day on average does a panel produce. Obv more in summer etc, but just want to know if it's worth the investment given the high energy prices but also that incentives have fallen away.

Flight3287462

Better if the house faced north south.  Try and find a reputable company that you can talk to and do as much reading as you can.

QrizB

Welcome to the forum.

There is a community of solar PV owners on the "Green & Ethical" board:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/categories/green-ethical-moneysaving

If you look at recent threads there you'll see lots of discussion plus regular reports of actual generation numbers.

Flight3287462 said:

Better if the house faced north south.

The total output will be higher with a south-facing array but you might get more benefit with an east-west split. It all depends on your use case.

If you're eg. away from home at work during the day you may not be able to make good use of a midday generation hump.

jimjames

Bluekarter said:

Looking for feedback from people that have had for a while and how much kWh per day on average does a panel produce. Obv more in summer etc, but just want to know if it's worth the investment given the high energy prices but also that incentives have fallen away.

You can see exactly how much is generated on this link. It does differ significantly between months of the year, in summer we get up to 20kWh generated but in winter it can be under 1kWh. Our panels have been installed over 10 years and are almost perfectly aligned so are about the maximum possible generation for the UK.

http://solar-panels-review.321web.co.uk/index.php/yearly-comparison-of-solar-pv

It's important to be aware that generation also isn't linear during the day. On a good day it starts low and peaks around midday before dropping off towards the end of the day. 

ProDave

I self installed my own 4kW PV system about 4 years ago.  Very please.

Think in terms of self using as much as you can, by time shifting as much electricity use as you can to the middle of the day, i.e. washing machine, dishwasher and tumble dryer one at a time around mid day.  And install a solar PV dump controller to send surplus power to your immersion heater.

For maximum self use, and east / west split makes sense half your panels on each side of the roof.  Total power produced will be lower but it will be spread over a longer period of time with less of a big mid day peak so is better suited to maximum self use.

With the new higher electricity prices I am easily self using £500 worth of electricity each year.  

Designing for self use is better than just accepting the pittance of 5p per kWh for export (or 7.5p if you are lucky) and if you don't want to claim the export payment, no need for an MCS install.

Benny2020

I have a 4kw array installed over 6 years ago.
Produces around 4200 kwh a year, maybe only 100 kwh in December and January but around 600 kwh in may/june/july, March so far is on track for 400 kwh.
Would not be without it.