Reducing carbon emissions

[GreiginFife]

Sounds very similar to the result I came to a couple of years ago. Once I got past the sales guff and entered the rabbit hole of actually trying to design a system around the constraints of the house the dream was over.

I have to give her credit for being open and honest on it. As soon as she looked at the roof style and available space V's the required energy she just said it would be incredibly difficult. She was going to send me information on smaller higher efficiency panels (apparently they exist but are almost 3 times the cost).

 

[Jimaroid]

I have to give her credit for being open and honest on it. As soon as she looked at the roof style and available space V's the required energy she just said it would be incredibly difficult. She was going to send me information on smaller higher efficiency panels (apparently they exist but are almost 3 times the cost).

I'd still be interested in knowing what you find out.

 

[bobmac]

That's really annoying when one site says 3-4 kw is enough for a family of 4 or 5 and you are told 7.5kw for a family of 3.
Sorry if I got your hopes up, it wasn't intentional.

 

[BrianM]

Does no one else not think solar panels look bloody awful on roofs.
That's the first thing that would stop me getting them

 

[PJ87]

I had a visit a few weeks ago from a guy who was trying to sell me a heat pump. £14,950
A few days later it came down to £11,500
No thanks, but....
He did tell me there are rumours about the govt. introducing a new incentive for solar panels next year so I should hang on.

One postive of brexit is the gov could set tax on solar and battery installs to a much lower level to encourage switching

I'm yet to see a positive so let's do this one

 

[GreiginFife]

I'd still be interested in knowing what you find out.

Not heard back on the small panels yet but they sent me a quote based on my maximum "viable roofspace" which is a 16 panel 5.8Kw system installed which has 3 options priced;

System only, no battery £6552
System with a 2.6Kw battery £7802
System with 5.2Kw (2 x 2.6Kw) batteries £9000

Initial thoughts would be, if that was enough power to run the whole home (inc garage) then that's not actually a bad price without the battery. £2450 for batteries is quite a jump though although I get the advantages.

Now I am in a fortunate position that I could afford that system, but I appreciate that for many £6.5K is a whole lot of money let alone £9K if they wanted batteries.

 

[PJ87]

Not heard back on the small panels yet but they sent me a quote based on my maximum "viable roofspace" which is a 16 panel 5.8Kw system installed which has 3 options priced;

System only, no battery £6552
System with a 2.6Kw battery £7802
System with 5.2Kw (2 x 2.6Kw) batteries £9000

Initial thoughts would be, if that was enough power to run the whole home (inc garage) then that's not actually a bad price without the battery. £2450 for batteries is quite a jump though although I get the advantages.

Now I am in a fortunate position that I could afford that system, but I appreciate that for many £6.5K is a whole lot of money let alone £9K if they wanted batteries.

Once we get to a time when 10k gets a decent system with say a 30kw battery I'm in ..

Least then I could keep the house going all time and top up with solar

 

[PJ87]

Maybe I been looking at this the wrong way all this time

We are high usage household, 20-25kw a day (50 when the car charges) night time is cheap as it is

So maybe I should get solar and sod the battery .. my house would most likely use all it generates anyways ...

 

[GreiginFife]

Maybe I been looking at this the wrong way all this time

We are high usage household, 20-25kw a day (50 when the car charges) night time is cheap as it is

So maybe I should get solar and sod the battery .. my house would most likely use all it generates anyways ...

The advice given to me today was that the buy-back schemes are so poor performing now that they offer no real incentive over just powering your home and optionally storing what you don't use. A secondary option was (if you have a hot water tank/immersion heater) to use spare to heat water and get "free hot water" with the excess energy (£299 optional add on for that).

You must be an exceptionally high usage household as the information today stated average electricity demand for a 4 bedroom house with a gas heating system was around 8Kw but up to around 12Kw in exceptional circumstances (averaging around 10Kw).

 

[PJ87]

The advice given to me today was that the buy-back schemes are so poor performing now that they offer no real incentive over just powering your home and optionally storing what you don't use. A secondary option was (if you have a hot water tank/immersion heater) to use spare to heat water and get "free hot water" with the excess energy (£299 optional add on for that).

You must be an exceptionally high usage household as the information today stated average electricity demand for a 4 bedroom house with a gas heating system was around 8Kw but up to around 12Kw in exceptional circumstances (averaging around 10Kw).

Must be, but we have a lot of electrical items

4 bed house, heat pump tumble, air conditioning, washing machine, oven etc

In winter we use a bit on underfloor heating in the downstairs loo as there is no heating in there and it gets very cold

I've seen us use as low as 15kw a day but with the kids it's 20-25 just the amount of washing

It's at least 8 loads (all tumble) a week and 1 dishwasher a night

For sake of argument I always work towards 11,000 kw a year

 

[larmen]

Not heard back on the small panels yet but they sent me a quote based on my maximum "viable roofspace" which is a 16 panel 5.8Kw system installed which has 3 options priced;

System only, no battery £6552
System with a 2.6Kw battery £7802
System with 5.2Kw (2 x 2.6Kw) batteries £9000

Initial thoughts would be, if that was enough power to run the whole home (inc garage) then that's not actually a bad price without the battery. £2450 for batteries is quite a jump though although I get the advantages.

Now I am in a fortunate position that I could afford that system, but I appreciate that for many £6.5K is a whole lot of money let alone £9K if they wanted batteries.

How much roof space are you talking about? Just to get the kW into context of square meters?
We have about 6m long fairly south facing roof line.

 

[Bdill93]

Must be, but we have a lot of electrical items

4 bed house, heat pump tumble, air conditioning, washing machine, oven etc

In winter we use a bit on underfloor heating in the downstairs loo as there is no heating in there and it gets very cold

I've seen us use as low as 15kw a day but with the kids it's 20-25 just the amount of washing

It's at least 8 loads (all tumble) a week and 1 dishwasher a night

For sake of argument I always work towards 11,000 kw a year

Air con in England! OOO how the other half live!

 

[PJ87]

Air con in England! OOO how the other half live!

Got to keep the staff at an comfortable temperature ?️

 

[GreiginFife]

How much roof space are you talking about? Just to get the kW into context of square meters?
We have about 6m long fairly south facing roof line.

Our roof is steeply pitched and I would estimate the "usable space" as about 12m2 our house (according to the quote info) has one usable side and is 40 degrees off south which apparently renders some of it next to useless.

 

[GreiginFife]

Must be, but we have a lot of electrical items

4 bed house, heat pump tumble, air conditioning, washing machine, oven etc

In winter we use a bit on underfloor heating in the downstairs loo as there is no heating in there and it gets very cold

I've seen us use as low as 15kw a day but with the kids it's 20-25 just the amount of washing

It's at least 8 loads (all tumble) a week and 1 dishwasher a night

For sake of argument I always work towards 11,000 kw a year

I think I'd be looking at reducing your carbon footprint before you look at reducing your carbon footprint

I have a lot of high draw electrical items as well but despise tumble driers so won't have one. But a couple of big amps and then the garage tools (big table saw, big mitre saw, big bench planer etc) but we are nowhere near that level of use.

 

[PJ87]

I think I'd be looking at reducing your carbon footprint before you look at reducing your carbon footprint

I have a lot of high draw electrical items as well but despise tumble driers so won't have one. But a couple of big amps and then the garage tools (big table saw, big mitre saw, big bench planer etc) but we are nowhere near that level of use.

The tumble is low because it's heat pump

We were similar usage before the air con

Think it's just the amount of electrical items rather than high usage. Lot of light bulbs but all led WiFi controlled ones so should be lowest usage

Dishwasher is on a smart plug so I can see that used 440kw in a year

We recently starting using an air fryer more than the oven so that reduced usage

The CCTV system doesn't use a lot of energy

I just think it all adds up as the high draw stuff all goes on at night

But then looking at it .. at night when nothing is on.. the house is pulling half a kw every hour .. so that does make sense as that's 12 kw a day. But that's winter when the floors on

 

[Blue in Munich]

Our roof is steeply pitched and I would estimate the "usable space" as about 12m2 our house (according to the quote info) has one usable side and is 40 degrees off south which apparently renders some of it next to useless.

Interesting; so a roof that’s about 25% north facing with the remainder split between due east and due west probably won’t be much use then…

 

[PJ87]

"Norway Is Running Out of Gas-Guzzling Cars to Tax | WIRED UK" https://www.wired.co.uk/article/norway-electric-vehicle-tax

 

[cliveb]

''The median cost of a 4kW installation has reduced from £20,000 in 2010 to £6,668 in 2017. This represents a 67% drop in median installation cost since 2010.''

https://greenbusinesswatch.co.uk/uk-domestic-solar-panel-costs-and-returns-2010-2017

I had a 4kW system installed in 2011 for £11,500. Did it really drop that much in one year?
(Unfortunately we've now moved)

 

[cliveb]

My dream is solar and batteries

My dream is wind turbine and batteries. Winter is when you need the power, and it tends to be less sunny and more windy in winter.