Solar Panels

How much do they cost? And how long do you have live for them to make a return on the investment and start saving money? (I’m in my late 50’s)
I live in a semi detached with stairs, and can’t imagine we will keep it when we are in our 90’s, but mil lives round the corner in a similar house and is still living there without any issues.

A 4 kw solar set up installed would probably cost £5k installed today, with no FIT, investing that in an ISA, pension, or Life Insurance would give a much better return.

The solar probably would break even in 15 or 20 yrs but your investment is gone - you do not get the £5k back - it’s gone. An ISA pays you the capital back plus interest, without an incentive scheme Solar is a poor investment.

We have solar panels to heat the water for hot water and central heating (since 2009) plus PV for electricity (since 2015). They feed two huge batteries in the basement, but we try and run washing machine, dishwasher etc when the sun is shining. They only need light. We've had some really sunny Februaries these past few years - you can reconstruct how much sun there was by checking your history on line.

DH reckons that they will have paid for themselves after about 10 years. Originally the prognosis was 15 years but the present trend in oil prices and electricity costs has brought that down.

MzOops has done it to lessen her carbon footprint.

They have done it so that it can all be removed and taken with them if and when they move.
Easier to do when you install it yourself I imagine.

Katie I disagree that the £5k would be gone, electricity is ‘free’ for about 15 years, if you are able to plan around the sunshine. Even in the Winter MzOops was able to use her Solar Energy. Although I think that £5k is quite a low figure.
I doubt that solar panels would put anyone off buying your house upon resale, it might even raise the value if prices of Oil and Electricity continue to rise.

Katie59

A 4 kw solar set up installed would probably cost £5k installed today, with no FIT, investing that in an ISA, pension, or Life Insurance would give a much better return.

The solar probably would break even in 15 or 20 yrs but your investment is gone - you do not get the £5k back - it’s gone. An ISA pays you the capital back plus interest, without an incentive scheme Solar is a poor investment.

I don't understand the logic of this. I don't know how much solar panels save, but if it's £5k a year, you could put that money into a savings account and the money wouldn't be "gone". After a certain time, most of the energy bill savings would be "interest", which would be far higher than any savings account is currently paying.

I think that the reason for putting in solar panels for us would be the knowledge that even if the costs of electricity, oil and gas go off the scale I would still be able to heat a tin of soup at least once a day. The present situation has made me think of solar panels in a slightly different light.

Depends how long you are going to live there, they can be cost effective after payback time. Its a gamble.

The present situation has made me think of solar panels in a slightly different light.

I'm sorry, but this made me smile

If you can do it yourself it’s far cheaper, if the panels are removable it makes it much easier as you just take them off and take them with you.
I doubt that we would recoup the costs, we will have to see how the Electricity and Oil prices go this year and do some calculations, however as I said before our South facing roof has dormer windows and not much actual roof space.
All new houses should be equipped with Solar Panels - by law.

Pamela hopefully a bright light!

Very bright?☀️

A 4 kw solar panel is likely to produce 3000kwh a year in the UK
Of that 2000 will be exported at say 6p. £120
Only 1000 are likely to be used at 20p £200

The amount of solar you can use depends when you are using power, doing washing and cooking mid day helps, car charging during the day will use most of the available solar when the sun shines.

Moving normal domestic routine to when the sun shines is not likely to give a good return on Solar, you need a way of using more, an EV to charge (slowly), maybe air conditioning in hot weather. So unless you have a way of using most of the solar you will break even in 15 to 20 yrs, depending on running costs, if £5000 in invested in a pension etc at a modest 5% you will get back over £13000 in 20yrs.

I’m not anti solar, the real benefit is commercial solar where most power is used during the day, refrigeration or factory processes.

Contact the Energy Savings Trust if you are considering installing solar panels. They have loads of information. I would advise also getting a roof survey done beforehand, especially if you have an older roof.

Next door had solar panels last year but are now complaining that MY trees, planted 40 years ago, are blocking the sun and can they come down!
Solar wars?

Well MissOops has just moved home and her new direct debit for Electricity and Gas is £289 per month.

Won’t take long to use up £5k.

Apart from a gas hob, she is all electric.

Katie59, yes I completely agree, a good and considered post.

There was not a brilliant return for us some years and I was always doing washing at the optimum solar time. You get a cloud and it blocks solar. When in the uk do we get long days of unbroken intense photons streaming from the sun? Maybe mid summer if we are lucky and then only a matter of a few weeks

Salespeople will always exagerate the projected income

Grammaretto

Next door had solar panels last year but are now complaining that MY trees, planted 40 years ago, are blocking the sun and can they come down!
Solar wars?

That is a point. We had to chop down three trees to allow the light to get to our panels but they were our own trees and they were overgrown conifers which made the house dark as well so it was no loss to get rid of them. At about the same time, everyone in the street was chopping down the conifers in their front garden - the houses had been built and the trees planted all about the same time and they were all getting out of hand.

My daughter and son-in-law had these installed on their house with that gov. grant, several years ago. Have long since, now, reaped the financial benefit of that original outlay.
My SiL now has a fully electric car and is extremely smug at present with everyone else complaining about fuel prices.

The only thing they did not have in the original fitting was protection against the pigeons. Had this done a couple of years later and they really do work. So, anyone having new ones, ensure it includes these protectors.

Calendargirl

We had our solar panels professionally installed nearly 7 years ago. Cost us £5500. Have had about £4500 back in FIT payments so far.

The money was earning peanuts in the bank/building society.

The fitters said our roof was ideal, south facing, not shaded from trees, neighbours roofs etc.

The payments were lower than if we had had it done years earlier, but the installation costs had gone down in the meantime, so evened out I suppose.

Same here Calendargirl, ours were installed April 2014, cost £5,500 & we’ve received £6,100 FIT payments to date. We’d got a quote a couple of years earlier but it was extortionate & we didn’t want to commit too much of our savings.
I’m careful to run my washing machine, tumble dryer, dishwasher etc at the sunniest time of day, and never run them together. Must admit that our electric bills have really benefitted and are much lower than they used to be (&compared to family bills) in terms of kWh billed.
Mind you, we’ve changed most of our lightbulbs for LED or low energy now & changed the ageing 250w security light which seemed to be on half the night, so I bet that’s helping!

we had solars fitted 2 weeks ago - they did have to remove 1 or 2 tiles - however, they took photos of them before and then again after so I could see if any damage had been done - which it hadn't. Love getting the free electricity.

I had solar panels put up a couple of years ago. From Spring through to Autumn my monthly bills are about £9 in other words, the standing charge only. In winter on bright days I do a wash, dishwash etc and it’s all ‘free’.
With the prices rising as they are the investment will be paid off sooner than expected.
There should be government investment in this because only the better off can afford to install and, as usual, the poor end up paying more.

Aged 75 we would never get our money back in our lifetime. Sunak's reduction in VAT only works if you can afford about £5000+ in the first instance.

I was told by installer that grants would soon be available