Another Energy Source

[crescent city Mike]

I've been struggling with fossil fuel usage and thought I had that moral dilemma conquered. I was wrong.
https://crescentcitybrewtalk.com/nuclear-steam-generator/

 

[foxy]

I've been struggling with fossil fuel usage and thought I had that moral dilemma conquered. I was wrong.
https://crescentcitybrewtalk.com/nuclear-steam-generator/

Just get solar panels, the electricity company buys my unused electricity as it goes into the grid.

 

[cheeseyfeet]

For those of us not in sunny climes that's not an option, I'd be lucky to power an LED with the light I get here in Scotland!

 

[Clint]

Burn wood.

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

Just get solar panels, the electricity company buys my unused electricity as it goes into the grid.

I didn't think the incentives were there for small scale Solar anymore. When did you have yours installed?

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

For those of us not in sunny climes that's not an option, I'd be lucky to power an LED with the light I get here in Scotland!

Solar could probably be a good thing on the eastern side of Scotland, where it is usually sunnier, due to the long summer days and cooler temperatures. (Solar panel are more efficient in cooler temperatures).

 

[foxy]

I didn't think the incentives were there for small scale Solar anymore. When did you have yours installed?

Installed mine in 2009 contract to supply electricity to the grid until 2024.

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

Installed mine in 2009 contract to supply electricity to the grid until 2024.

Are you in the UK? If so, is that the Feed in Tariff?

 

[HSD]

Been looking into this solar panels are a lot more efficient than they were, also various heat exchanger systems air or ground

 

[Redwulf]

We have a 4KW solar system (14 Panels I think) on an old tariff but my understanding is the new ones are not very good. However I had to swap an inverter last year and while chatting the the Electrician he was explaining that he now his solar panels into a power wall and uses this for his domestic electricity and tops up from the Grid when required.

He seemed to think this was saving him more then he'd earn on a feed in.

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

We have a 4KW solar system (14 Panels I think) on an old tariff but my understanding is the new ones are not very good. However I had to swap an inverter last year and while chatting the the Electrician he was explaining that he now his solar panels into a power wall and uses this for his domestic electricity and tops up from the Grid when required.

He seemed to think this was saving him more then he'd earn on a feed in.

I had mine installed in 2011. At the time there was no such thing as a power wall. The batteries would cost as much as the PV system and fill half the garage!

 

[Redwulf]

I had mine installed in 2011. At the time there was no such thing as a power wall. The batteries would cost as much as the PV system and fill half the garage!

Same here, ours was installed in 2011-2012 and the contract transferred to us in 2019 when we got the house, so we've got a good 16-17 years left, by which time I would hope the battery and generation technology would have evolved significantly.

I believe the FIT dropped for systems installed after 2019 to about 5p per KW compared with old tariffs from 2011-2012. So in my opinion the only way to make it worthwhile would be to install it with some kind of storage.

Funnily enough I thought would increase the cost, but installing a system with panels and storage is actually cheaper then it was to install a generation only system back in 2012 looking at the receipts we got with the house.

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

Same here, ours was installed in 2011-2012 and the contract transferred to us in 2019 when we got the house, so we've got a good 16-17 years left, by which time I would hope the battery and generation technology would have evolved significantly.

I believe the FIT dropped for systems installed after 2019 to about 5p per KW compared with old tariffs from 2011-2012. So in my opinion the only way to make it worthwhile would be to install it with some kind of storage.

Funnily enough I thought would increase the cost, but installing a system with panels and storage is actually cheaper then it was to install a generation only system back in 2012 looking at the receipts we got with the house.

The FiT incentives were so high, (I get nearly 60p for every KWH my system generates) but this in turn made the installation costs high. Solar companies could charge a small fortune because the consumers could earn a small fortune. The FiT almost halved shortly after I had mine installed but funnily enough so did the cost for installing a solar system.

 

[ChilledGecko]

I got in to solar when the fit tariffs were at their best, stuck as much as I could on the roof and they paid back in sub 7 years.

Since then I've had a non fit array fitted to an out house and had a 12kwh (10kwh usable) battery system along side.
In the summer the batteries max out most days and in the winter months I charge them overnight on a cheap tariff and get through most of the day on battery power.
I'm not sure if they will payback in the short term but I expect at some point in their life cycle they will.

The power companies get 'excited' when they see my usage pattern as I don't fit the norm and insist my direct debit will not be sufficient to cover projected costs. I tend to swap suppliers regularly and always when approaching the winter months

 

[johncrobinson]

Thats the way to do it Gecko.

Unfortunately the only solar power i can take advantage of is what comes through the window.
Which in northern Scotland is not much at all.

 

[clyne]

Bear in mind that solar panels don’t need sun to operate, they need light. Yes they’ll be more efficient on sunny days but during summer months even on a cloudy day you’ll be generating ‘leccy. I live at the tip of Scotland and have solar panels that work really well. In the summer especially where we can have 20ish hours of daylight. I’ve also got a solar immersion so that any unused electric gets diverted to the hot water tank using less oil/electric to top it up.

 

[Cwrw666]

We heat our house with 2 woodburners. OK I do use some coal for a bit of extra instant heat but mostly it's wood and I cut that myself. As far as I'm concerned burning wood is pretty much carbon neutral - the trees grow, I burn them, the trees regrow. Only fossil fuel useage is about 1 gallon of petrol to cut a years supply of wood and another of diesel to cart it in.
Believe it or not I keep getting bombarded with adverts for grants to convert to LPG central heating as part of the governments move to carbon neutrality.

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

Bear in mind that solar panels don’t need sun to operate, they need light. Yes they’ll be more efficient on sunny days but during summer months even on a cloudy day you’ll be generating ‘leccy.

That is true, but there is a huge difference in generation between sunny and cloudy.
The green line on the graph below shows the energy generation from my PV system yesterday which was a partly cloudy day. No prizes for guessing which times were the cloudy times!

 

[foxy]

I am in Australia so cloudy days are rare. Our feed in wasaround 62 cents and outgoings around 18 cents. The government (state) are now offering batteries for half price.

 

[ChilledGecko]

I had a snake oil salesman tell me solar panels would operate under star light, just sign here
Needless to say he found the door quicker than expected!