Green Energy

[Rossi fan]

Hi all,

Until a month ago, I had no idea that Solar PV Electricity Panels were such a good investment. If you have a suitable roof and buy the panels, you receive a payment for each unit of electricity you generate and an additional payment for units you dont use and feed back into the grid, called a feed in tarriff. Never let a company install them on your roof for free as they make all the money from the tarrif and you have to buy youself out if you sell your house. If you own the panels, you can sell the remaining tarrif on to the new owner.

For 2010/11, the generation payment is .433p per unit and the feed back payment is .031p. ( usually deemed at 50% of your output. These payments are guaranteed for 25 years. It will go down each year from next April.

This means that your PV system will pay for itself in under 8 years and then you go on getting these payments for the remaining 17 years.

Ours was installed yesterday. Cost £10250 for the maximum 4kwp system. The estimate is that it will generate around 2k in feed in tarrifs and electricity savings each year. £50k back for a 10k investment. Today, on a cloudy day, we generated 14 units, which amounts to £6.28 in tarrifs. Thats over £2200 per annum. Obviously, it will not generate as much in winter, but summer should be the main earning period.

Thanks,

Paul

[Snackmore]

I remember seeing on dragons den how good the return is, basically they said if you have any money to invest then do it in solar panels. Accepting that not many have that sort of cash lying around however

[Rossi fan]

I remember seeing on dragons den how good the return is, basically they said if you have any money to invest then do it in solar panels. Accepting that not many have that sort of cash lying around however

Hi,
We dont have the cash to spare. We have borrowed from Marks and Spencer at 6.6% and the feed in tarriffs and the reduced energy costs, will hopefully pay the loan off. If I am right, then for me its a no brainer.

The first two quarters will be the worst, but we can make up the slack, if we dont generate enough through to spring, but summer should balance it all out. Longer term though, I hope to have gas and edlectricity bills paid for out of the tarrifs once the loan is repaid in 7 years.

The government has allowed the utilities to hike prices over the last couple of years, with more to come, so they can pay the feed in tarriffs to people who elect to have green energy. Therefore, homes without solar, are effectively paying for the ones that do. have a look at this.
http://www.inbalance-energy.co.uk/artic ... riffs.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thanks,

Paul

[Venderbase]

You could even transfer it to 0% credit cards for 2 years.

[Rossi fan]

You could even transfer it to 0% credit cards for 2 years.

I know someone who is doing that. He will then get another, or a loan.

[Coin Operated Group]

What is the brand of the panels? wondered what costs are to install yourself?

[Rossi fan]

What is the brand of the panels? wondered what costs are to install yourself?

They are Suntech, but ou need to make sure your roof orientation is right and strong enough. In addition, for your energy supplier to pay the feed in tarrif, you need to have it installed by an MCS accredited supplier, so I think DIY is out really.

My supplier has fixed price deals. Many are rip off merchants. We had 5 quotes and this company were the only one that provided a full structural survey, before advising me and they were honest about the limitations of the panels, which others were not.

Thanks,

Paul

[Eatsweets]

Paul is right solar is a good investment only if you are south facing and have give or take a 30 degree pitch on your roof. The original trials were based on studies carried out in the south coast on a building practically on the cliffs, therefore no one has an exact generation calculation.

Other things worth noting are:-

The feed in tariff will rise with the retail price index, if you believe the government then your feed in tariff will be about £3 per kw in £25 years, realistically it will be about 50p.

Things like trees and chimney stacks may need to be moved moved due to shading, even a satellite dish can cause upto 60% shading.

The max system a house can have is 4kw unless you are lucky enough to have a 3 phase supply, then you can have 4kw per phase (3 phase is only usually found in either older or large domestic properties).

Most roofs will hold the weight as one panel weighs less than a bag of sugar. A 4kw system using bp panels takes up 36 square meters.

There are rumours that a green tax will be levied in 2014, which means that any house that does not have some form of renewable energy will pay a higher energy bill.

At the moment there are no grants available for solar, despite what some companies will have you believe. There is however again another rumour that as of April next year every homeowner will be eligible for a £10k grant secured against their property by the government.

Solar is a viable option but a costly one, another option is to install an air source heat pump (looks like an air conditioning unit) this uses the air temperature outside to heat your hot water and heating. These can be installed from as little as £2k and I think they also have a generation tariff of about 12p per kw.

With any renewable energy product when you sell your house you can exclude it from the sale, the buyer gets the feed in tariff and cheaper energy, you get the important one the generation tariff.

Loophole - if you own a field of let's say an acre, fill it up with solar panels but don't connect them back to the grid. You will still get paid for generating the electricity even though it goes nowhere.

Claim to fame - I was the 288th approved solar installer in the uk.

[flandersbontempi]

This is good for finding out if you have a suitable house.

Bugger I seem to be facing west

http://www.freesolar.co.uk/roof-checker.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Eatsweets]

Phill you can buy a sun tracker, looks like a NASA style tripod, stick it at the end of your garden mount the solar panels on it and it will move to follow the sun all day. Set you back about £50k, how many do you want?? lol