Omega Owners Forum
Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: Varche on 14 July 2022, 14:29:56
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Living in a sunny country and with prices of kit coming down plus electric going up, we took the plunge.
Ordered in April. Lots of delays. Hardest thing was getting a digger to dig four holes of a cu metre each. All the diggers are making good money working on the myriad of huge solar farms.
Anyway. We have a stand alone frame 5 x 4 metres , high enough to park a transit under. 16 panels ((2 by 1 m). 7.5 kw, a similar sized invertor and batteres. The latter are still quite expensive.
Still got mains connection but that is just for security. Also not worth disconnecting as reconnection costs a fortune here and takes ages. So will still be paying monthly standing charge.
Quite a complex install as we have 3 phase electric and a three phase well pump for irrigation and swimming pool water. Rural properties are served with 3 phase over twisted bell wire. As a result we can only have 5.5 kw max ( over that it trips)
I keep popping in to see how much is being generated. Any excess goes into the grid and after a wait of months the grid company agrees to pay you a tiny payment. Might be EU grant money available but I wont hold my breath. We do get half price council tax for a couple of years.
Payback? At least ten years but we didn’t do it to save money. We could well be dead before break even day!
Anyone else got panels or their own windmill?
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No
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No
Surprised you haven't invested in this kind of thing, you being a vegan an all :-\
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we fitted solar on the house roof about 10-11 years back
due to a cock up with installer we just missed the higher payback tarriff
I like the idea of a freestanding carport solar kit, can I ask what kind of costing are you on?
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No
Surprised you haven't invested in this kind of thing, you being a vegan an all :-\
.............and your huge energy bill with running the OOF... :D ;)
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we fitted solar on the house roof about 10-11 years back
due to a cock up with installer we just missed the higher payback tarriff
I like the idea of a freestanding carport solar kit, can I ask what kind of costing are you on?
Well lets not get too excited. It is located in our olive grove between mature trees. I can get our 4x4 under it but wouldnt dream of taking a road car there. I think a future owner of the property would install an ev charger point next the house. What do you mean by what kind of costing are you on?
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Got a 3.6kw system here. I reckon 3 -4 year payback period including batteries which should arrive in September
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Not yet
But my plan is for a 5/10 acre solor farm (Field basesd)
Plus roof panels over my garage extention.
Also looking into solor roofed green house.
Plus looked at Ground force water & heat supplies etc.
Lots of daft questions in my head still. Prob the daftest one is what happens during a power and the batteries are full, what happens to the leccy that feeds back into the grid - do the neighbers end up on free power?
Also looking into Bio mass boilers, need underfloor heating for the garage extentios & keeping the pool warm.
Cost versus return obviously a big thing
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Not yet
But my plan is for a 5/10 acre solor farm (Field basesd)
Plus roof panels over my garage extention.
Also looking into solor roofed green house.
Plus looked at Ground force water & heat supplies etc.
Lots of daft questions in my head still. Prob the daftest one is what happens during a power and the batteries are full, what happens to the leccy that feeds back into the grid - do the neighbers end up on free power?
Also looking into Bio mass boilers, need underfloor heating for the garage extentios & keeping the pool warm.
Cost versus return obviously a big thing
You can heat water (for baths, washing etc) if your batteries are full or power electric underfloor heating .
obviously ,making your home more efficient in the first place is money well spent , good insulation, efficient appliances etc ;)
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I think a common theme of new owners is looking at usage very regularly and thinking of load balancing. The electrician is monitoring our system via the app and asked us not to use it! Fine by me as plenty else to do.
Panels sell for 164 euros in our B and Q equivalent.
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Not yet
But my plan is for a 5/10 acre solor farm (Field basesd)
Plus roof panels over my garage extention.
Also looking into solor roofed green house.
Plus looked at Ground force water & heat supplies etc.
Lots of daft questions in my head still. Prob the daftest one is what happens during a power and the batteries are full, what happens to the leccy that feeds back into the grid - do the neighbers end up on free power?
Also looking into Bio mass boilers, need underfloor heating for the garage extentios & keeping the pool warm.
Cost versus return obviously a big thing
5/10 acres is a big investment. And will take a lot of effort to get going. Getting it past planning for one thing. Plus you could be looking at a substantial bill from the DNO to upgrade their equipment.
Then need to look at the tarrif you get cos I doubt it will be micro generation
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I don't have one yet, mostly because I've never planned to stay in a house more than 2-3yrs. That's changed now and I will be investing in solar (and probably a battery) soon enough. With energy prices where they are, I reckon a payback of around 4-5yrs is realistic on the SSW facing roof of our new place. :y
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Given the prices that MCS approved fitters charge the only way to get 4-5 year payback is DIY fit I’m afraid and I would suggest buying the kit in the winter now. No way you’ll get anything decent before September
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I've been pondering fitting a DIY 12V solar system like they use in caravans and boats etc just for lights.
My house is a bungalow, so wiring in a 12V DC lighting circuit alongside the existing 240v light circuits would be fairly straight forward, and I'd have thought that modern 12V LED lights would throw out enough light? ???
Last time I looked, the solar panels, a control unit, a few leisure batteries and other bits and bobs would probably come in at under £1500 and my house is kinda SE facing so I get plenty of sun in the mornings.
I'm not sure if I would save enough just on the lights to make it worthwhile though. :-\
It would probably look a bit 'Heath Robinson' as well, so I'm not sure my neighbours would approve either! ;D
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I've been pondering fitting a DIY 12V solar system like they use in caravans and boats etc just for lights.
My house is a bungalow, so wiring in a 12V DC lighting circuit alongside the existing 240v light circuits would be fairly straight forward, and I'd have thought that modern 12V LED lights would throw out enough light? ???
Last time I looked, the solar panels, a control unit, a few leisure batteries and other bits and bobs would probably come in at under £1500 and my house is kinda SE facing so I get plenty of sun in the mornings.
I'm not sure if I would save enough just on the lights to make it worthwhile though. :-\
It would probably look a bit 'Heath Robinson' as well, so I'm not sure my neighbours would approve either! ;D
Yeah. Car headlights dangling from the ceiling would look a bit weird ;D
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we fitted solar on the house roof about 10-11 years back
due to a cock up with installer we just missed the higher payback tarriff
I like the idea of a freestanding carport solar kit, can I ask what kind of costing are you on?
Well lets not get too excited. It is located in our olive grove between mature trees. I can get our 4x4 under it but wouldnt dream of taking a road car there. I think a future owner of the property would install an ev charger point next the house. What do you mean by what kind of costing are you on?
That sounds impressive. :y
I'll wager you are the only 'olive grove owner' on OOF.
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we fitted solar on the house roof about 10-11 years back
due to a cock up with installer we just missed the higher payback tarriff
I like the idea of a freestanding carport solar kit, can I ask what kind of costing are you on?
Well lets not get too excited. It is located in our olive grove between mature trees. I can get our 4x4 under it but wouldnt dream of taking a road car there. I think a future owner of the property would install an ev charger point next the house. What do you mean by what kind of costing are you on?
That sounds impressive. :y
I'll wager you are the only 'olive grove owner' on OOF.
Both my neighbours either side have big olive trees in pots in their gardens, so I could say I live in an olive grove. :)
OK it's a bit of a stretch! ;D
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I've been pondering fitting a DIY 12V solar system like they use in caravans and boats etc just for lights.
My house is a bungalow, so wiring in a 12V DC lighting circuit alongside the existing 240v light circuits would be fairly straight forward, and I'd have thought that modern 12V LED lights would throw out enough light? ???
Last time I looked, the solar panels, a control unit, a few leisure batteries and other bits and bobs would probably come in at under £1500 and my house is kinda SE facing so I get plenty of sun in the mornings.
I'm not sure if I would save enough just on the lights to make it worthwhile though. :-\
It would probably look a bit 'Heath Robinson' as well, so I'm not sure my neighbours would approve either! ;D
Yeah. Car headlights dangling from the ceiling would look a bit weird ;D
Hmm hadn't thought of car headlights. :-\
It would give my house a Mad Max feel. :y ;D
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I've been pondering fitting a DIY 12V solar system like they use in caravans and boats etc just for lights.
My house is a bungalow, so wiring in a 12V DC lighting circuit alongside the existing 240v light circuits would be fairly straight forward, and I'd have thought that modern 12V LED lights would throw out enough light? ???
Last time I looked, the solar panels, a control unit, a few leisure batteries and other bits and bobs would probably come in at under £1500 and my house is kinda SE facing so I get plenty of sun in the mornings.
I'm not sure if I would save enough just on the lights to make it worthwhile though. :-\
It would probably look a bit 'Heath Robinson' as well, so I'm not sure my neighbours would approve either! ;D
Yeah. Car headlights dangling from the ceiling would look a bit weird ;D
Hmm hadn't thought of car headlights. :-\
It would give my house a Mad Max feel. :y ;D
……and along those lines, it would be even better if the headlights were still attached to a car front section………you know like those bench seats made out of the front of a Mini 8) :D ;)
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I've been pondering fitting a DIY 12V solar system like they use in caravans and boats etc just for lights.
My house is a bungalow, so wiring in a 12V DC lighting circuit alongside the existing 240v light circuits would be fairly straight forward, and I'd have thought that modern 12V LED lights would throw out enough light? ???
Last time I looked, the solar panels, a control unit, a few leisure batteries and other bits and bobs would probably come in at under £1500 and my house is kinda SE facing so I get plenty of sun in the mornings.
I'm not sure if I would save enough just on the lights to make it worthwhile though. :-\
It would probably look a bit 'Heath Robinson' as well, so I'm not sure my neighbours would approve either! ;D
Add on another grand and you could have 12 panels 3.6kw inverter grid tied.diy fit. Much more useable
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I’ve had a 4 kw array, cost ~£14k, for 12 years, so get the full FIT. In cash terms it was paid for in 8 years, but as I only started keeping records when they were fitted, I can’t tell how much leccy I haven’t used, but I would guess it probably took the return back to 7 years. In the past 4 years I’ve received £3500 in tax free FIT.
For interest my roof is a few degrees West of due South so arguably ideal, yet a neighbour who had a similar array fitted split between each E/W roof face only 6 years ago, (roof is at right angles to mine) generates ~ 10% more than me. I assume that this due to more efficient equipment.
I cannot understand, given climate change, energy costs etc. why it is not mandatory to fit solar roof tiles to new houses, or could it be that a Conservative Govt. receives financial support from energy companies?
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I agree. Renewables and better insulation and maybe turn the thermostat down as the Germans may have to. Better than opening up coal mines and extending lives of coal fire power stations?
May well be academic if Nordstream 1 never reopens
Plus I dare say most of the kit comes from China…….
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I cannot understand, given climate change, energy costs etc. why it is not mandatory to fit solar roof tiles to new houses, or could it be that a Conservative Govt. receives financial support from energy companies?
new houses will struggle to comply without panels from this june just gone
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I had an EPC done recently on a typical stone built 3 bed end terrace with a good 300mm of loft insulation which only achieved an E rating. :-\
The downstairs floors are laminate with a 5mm polystyrene type underlay. I told the inspector this and he said that he'd have to put down that the house had no floor insulation, as he couldn't see it. ::)
These are the improvement recommendations:-
Internal or External wall insulation. Cost: £4000-£14,000 Yearly saving: £363
Floor insulation. Cost: £4000-£6000 Yearly saving: £50
Solar Water Heating. Cost: £4000-£6000 Yearly saving: £27
Solar PV panels 2.5KW. Cost: £3500-£5500 Yearly saving: £343
So according to the EPC report I could spend up to £20,000 on insulation alone to save an estimated £413 a year! ::)
I guess I'd be saving the planet though. No? :)
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Our house, with a stone wall at the front land no wall cavities to put insulation into, is also E rated. I'll continue paying massive energy bills and worry about it when/if we come to sell.
The recommendations to get it up to a C rating were at a similar cost to yours, Tigger, with a similar saving. Come to think of it, to save any bother, I'll just offer any potential purchaser £20K off the asking price and tell them to spend it on heating the place :)
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Seems as though a lot of the 'powers that be' don't realise there's a hell of a lot of older properties in the UK.
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Seems as though a lot of the 'powers that be' don't realise there's a hell of a lot of older properties in the UK.
You almost sound surprised by that ;D
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Seems as though a lot of the 'powers that be' don't realise there's a hell of a lot of older properties in the UK.
Oh, but they do only too well and it's scared them silly as they (MP's in Parliament / the Government) know how much it is going to take to rectify it all! ::) ::) :o
It is like the need for new, mass built, social housing that this coutry requires; none of them want to face up to the cost within the lifetime of a Government, so the can just gets kicked further down the road! >:(
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Seems as though a lot of the 'powers that be' don't realise there's a hell of a lot of older properties in the UK.
You almost sound surprised by that ;D
Not really, just a thought of how hard it is to insulate a hell of a lot of properties. :P
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Global warming will help with gas consumption, surely? 20°on Christmas Day, lovely 😅
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Global warming will help with gas consumption, surely? 20°on Christmas Day, lovely 😅
Christ 20℃ on Christmas Day? :o
The snowflakes would meltdown! ;D
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Global warming will help with gas consumption, surely? 20°on Christmas Day, lovely 😅
Christ 20℃ on Christmas Day? :o
The snowflakes would meltdown! ;D
Rain would help the grass to grow so you could get your mower out on Boxing Day to annoy the neighbours, :)
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Global warming will help with gas consumption, surely? 20°on Christmas Day, lovely 😅
Christ 20℃ on Christmas Day? :o
The snowflakes would meltdown! ;D
Rain would help the grass to grow so you could get your mower out on Boxing Day to annoy the neighbours, :)
Nah I'd still be sat by my BBQ drinking a few coldies mate! :y
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Our house, with a stone wall at the front land no wall cavities to put insulation into, is also E rated. I'll continue paying massive energy bills and worry about it when/if we come to sell.
The recommendations to get it up to a C rating were at a similar cost to yours, Tigger, with a similar saving. Come to think of it, to save any bother, I'll just offer any potential purchaser £20K off the asking price and tell them to spend it on heating the place :)
Just looked up our EPC, it's actually an F ;D
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Our house, with a stone wall at the front land no wall cavities to put insulation into, is also E rated. I'll continue paying massive energy bills and worry about it when/if we come to sell.
The recommendations to get it up to a C rating were at a similar cost to yours, Tigger, with a similar saving. Come to think of it, to save any bother, I'll just offer any potential purchaser £20K off the asking price and tell them to spend it on heating the place :)
Just looked up our EPC, it's actually an F ;D
You may as well knock it down then! :)
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Global warming will help with gas consumption, surely? 20°on Christmas Day, lovely 😅
Hopefully Christmas in Dubai and NYE in the Caribbean ;D
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Global warming will help with gas consumption, surely? 20°on Christmas Day, lovely 😅
Hopefully Christmas in Dubai and NYE in the Caribbean ;D
It'll save anyone over here having to put up with you :)