Solar Panels

Would you believe it - the whole team turned up today at 8am after a night of hail and snow. I was worried about the danger of going on the roof and asked if they were insured? Mostly young men, they laughed it off.
But thank God they were finished by 4pm - all done.
The older man, who did all the electrics for the new battery, seemed to have the biggest work load.

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growstuff

Please could you post details of any pension scheme currently offering 5% for a £5,000 investment because I'm genuinely interested. I have that kind of amount to invest and couldn't find anything offering anything like 5%.

If you have a pot of cash to invest long term a Pension or a Stocks and Shares ISA is the way to go. Over the past 10 yrs the average annual growth has been over 9%. Nothing is guaranteed, some years are better than others, managed funds have done well

kjmpde

we have 2 panels which heat the water only and was installed by the builder when the house was built. the water gets really hot in the summer. We wish the builder had put one on the front and one on the back as in the winter the back of the house gets more sun . Those houses that are opposite to us, benefit from the "free" hot water for most of the year

we used to have 2 solar thermal panels, they were built into the new build house, far and away the best and most efficient way to use the warmth from the sun. They use warmth and not photons, they don`t release electrons to make a current. Same as putting a black metal container in the sun, it will heat up fast. They need a special tank (solarcyl) with 2 coils, one at the bottom for solar and one mid way for immersion when there is not enough sun warmth. The tanks are large and would be expensive to retrofit, impossible for those of us with combi boilers and no tank.

They provide a huge amount of very hot water and are very energy-efficient wheareas solar panels use a large amount of silicon and are only 20% efficient. New solar films are being worked on right now, possibly around 35-40% efficient and very lightweight and cheap to produce

Please could you post details of any pension scheme currently offering 5% for a £5,000 investment because I'm genuinely interested. I have that kind of amount to invest and couldn't find anything offering anything like 5%.

Esspee

*growstuff*. Your figures make much more sense. We broke even in 7 years with just the Feed in tariff plus we had the use of the free electricity we generated. Now the feed in tariff is pure profit and we still get to use all the current we generate.
How I wish we could get 5% interest.

Solar panels are a long fixed term investment, there is no chance to get anything back early.
The money invested in a pension can be expected to grow by at least 5% per year on average and you have the option of taking the cash out early if you need to.
The FIT scheme was a good deal but that’s gone now, it all depends on how much power you can use in the house.

we have 2 panels which heat the water only and was installed by the builder when the house was built. the water gets really hot in the summer. We wish the builder had put one on the front and one on the back as in the winter the back of the house gets more sun . Those houses that are opposite to us, benefit from the "free" hot water for most of the year

When the Government were first subsidising solar panels my late husband worked it out it would take around 25-30 years before it had paid for itself. You still have to pay the standing charges for electricity also it's not so good if you have gas central heating and gas cooking.

I looked into solar a few years ago but my roof isn't ideal so decided against it. When I move I hope to either buy a house with them already installed or one with a suitable roof so I can install them. For me it's not just about financial viability but about helping the environment. Besides, if you buy outright, surely they add value to your house even if you move, and your heirs will benefit if you die before you get back the full cost.

A lot of us seem to be thinking," I won't reap the benefits so I won't bother."
I have been thinking about this. It doesn't only apply to solar panels.
When we were looking to move a lot of houses needed new kitchens, bathrooms etc. Most had been occupied by elderly people. I wondered if they had money in the bank but didn't spend on home improvement as they thought they were too old to benefit.
The problem is that younger people do not have the savings to do these improvements and have to borrow (if they can) just for the necessities.
I would rather leave my children an energy efficient up to date house than cash in the bank.

Definitely they are worth getting, if you can be sure that you will be using them for 15-20 years. Ours were already on the roof and we used them for 10 years, not cost-effective for us as the eco house cost a lot more. At the end of the day, the nice kitchen sold the house, not the solar panels but if you can afford them, have a very suitable position and will be staying, then yes, go for them but be sure to get the better quality panels. Just to add that the original installer went bust, so any guarantee was useless, many installers went bust and yet again, it will be the bandwagon in play, lots jumping on, for a while

growstuff. Your figures make much more sense. We broke even in 7 years with just the Feed in tariff plus we had the use of the free electricity we generated. Now the feed in tariff is pure profit and we still get to use all the current we generate.
How I wish we could get 5% interest.

My solar panels paid for themselves in about seven years. During that time my bills were lower as I was using the electricity they generated while also being paid for generating it whether or not I used it. (sounds more complex than it is).
Our new car is charged up during the day so we will be saving a small fortune hopefully.

No grant and the expense means you have to live a long while to get your money back (and not move house of course!).

Unless you can site wind turbines away from house and you neighbours forget them! We had one on our narrow boat (fitted by the previous owner) and it either rumbled continuously or in strong wind howled like a cheap horror movie - nightmare!

Katie59

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.

Sorry. I'm obviously being thick here. Where can you get an interest rate of a "modest" 5% on £5000 at the moment? You'd be lucky to get 1-2%, which wouldn't give anything like a return of £13,000 in 20 years.

If you have £5000 to invest and buy solar panels, the "cost" is the loss of up to £100 a year in lost interest offset against the saving in electricity, which is likely to be more, according to your own figures. Use the profit to set aside the difference between actual electricity bills and what they would be without solar panels. With electricity prices projected to rise even more, the break even point will come sooner.

We’ve got solar panels and they’re a no-brainer now (if you’re south facing). Luckily we have an old fashioned meter so it spins backwards when the sun is out. We get cheques from the FIT 4 times a year. I simply can’t understand why it’s not law for all suitable new builds to have them.

Auntiflo MzOops batteries are Voltacon batteries and they have Inverters, (not sure if that is just one or several inverters) , they have 4 batteries in a small outdoor shed and 18 solar panels.

As you can probably tell, although I’ve seen the set up, I have no real knowledge of any of this, only what MzOops tells me. I have no idea what an inverter is or what it does!

Have looked into solar panels many times over the past 13 years. Always came to the conclusion need to do it when young to reap long term reward and they are not environmentally friendly to produce kind of like electric cars.

Had solar fitted when first came out, cost us £10k but been there 12 teams and not only have we made our money and some back from the FIT payments plus free electricity fur washing vooking etc. Payments guaranteed for 25 years.

March 2012

Have had solar panels for 10 years when my husband finally received his inheritance 18 months after my lovely MIL died.

Cost £7000. Get back about £1500 a year. Paid for itself twice now.
This was just before the Gov reduced the money they would pay for generating electricity, in March 2010.
About 49p per unit at the time and rising.
Lot less now for new people starting off with solar panels.

Changed to Octopus, just before we even knew that the electricity companies were going to go out of business, because my husband had bought an electric car and he wanted their cheap rate electricty to charge the car at 5p per kwh overnight.
Much , much cheaper to use his car rather than mine.

They didn't strip the roof when they did ours 7 years ago. We paid about 6k and they have more than paid for themselves now. We have hot water when they aren't using the electricity they are generating and they run the pool. Even in the winter we get a decent payback on the FIT tariff. We are really pleased with them. We bought them outright so no problems with ownership.

tictacnana

We looked into it years ago but didn’t like the legal implications eg . when selling or releasing equity .

I sold my home 5 years ago with solar panels installed and there was absolutely no legal issues.

We looked into it years ago but didn’t like the legal implications eg . when selling or releasing equity .