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My house has a long south facing roof on the South coast of England - probably the perfect spot for solar. I’m also 95% certain my next car will be electric.
Having started investigating, the solar panel & battery setup I’d need will be £10-15k - a hell of an outlay.
Any experience here of this type of system?
Will it give you enough return on investment, plus maintenance costs, over and above mains ? You might need to do some comparisons.
We've got PV on two houses (one of which is 100% electrically powered/heated) and it works well from April until the end of September/October.
We got in when the FIT payments were frankly massive so it's made good financial sense, but now it's a closer thing as the FIT payments are much, much lower.
If you do it I really wouldn't bother with a battery - it just doesn't make financial sense yet. Defo get an Immersun (or some other diverter) to send your spare production to the immersion/heater/electric underfloor. At out other house the PV gives us all our hot water from April until well into autumn.
At our main house it saves us burning oil for hot water during the same period.
Every new house should have some sort of PV in my view.
plus maintenance costs
For us this has been a grand total of £zero in the 8 years we've had the system
It’s partly about money, partly wanting to be greener. I have electric UFH, electric induction hob, plus wanting the potential to charge 1-2 EVs.
I reckon I could use virtually zero electricity from the grid in summer months, and much less in the winter.
From a current driving fuel bill of £2k, plus £1k per year electricity costs I should easily break even inside 10 years, even though EVs are more expensive to buy.
Solar Battery systems are still expensive, but without one I don’t see solar making much impact as most power will be needed outside peak light hours.
FITs have gone haven’t they?
Yep, the Fit scheme has closed.
Apparently it’s going to be replaced with something but not sure what
Just googled and a replacement for the FiT is planned - some kind of solar export guarantee. I guess this means that the prohibitive cost of a solar battery system isn’t required, as you just put in solar when available, taking grid electricity when you need it.
I reckon I could use virtually zero electricity from the grid in summer months, and much less in the winter.
Don't forget that you should really change the way you use power to fit in with when the PV us producing the most power i.e. around lunchtime.
In the winter PV produces very little, so don't plan on any savings during those 6 months.