Any ' a shade greener ' customers

Page may contain affiliate links. Please see terms for details.
OP
OP
biggs682

biggs682

Itching to get back on my bike's
Location
Northamptonshire
Archie_tect exactley , but any saving is better than none and we are doing our bit for the universe , waiting for our passwords so we can log on and see what we are producing
 

Archie_tect

De Skieven Architek... aka Penfold + Horace
Location
Northumberland
The only frustrating bit is that the cost of paying the PV Feed In Tarrifs is passed on by adding to everyone else's electricity bills.
 
OP
OP
biggs682

biggs682

Itching to get back on my bike's
Location
Northamptonshire
2 weeks in and all done now including scaffolding gone , seeing some good output too early to see any difference in our bill yet
 

MarkF

Guru
Location
Yorkshire
The only frustrating bit is that the cost of paying the PV Feed In Tarrifs is passed on by adding to everyone else's electricity bills.

Yes, added onto the bills of very people who would be unlikely to be able to afford such installations. I could/would never do it.
 
OP
OP
biggs682

biggs682

Itching to get back on my bike's
Location
Northamptonshire
had our first bill today and we have used £44 worth of electricity before standing charges for 2 months making a saving of roughly 1 third
 

02GF74

Über Member
so far we have produced 726kwh and saved 312.18kg of co2

you conveniently forget the co2 generated in producing the panels, having them delivered from china to uk, installed etc.

In the long term that will pale into insignificance but there is not such thing as a free lunch.
 
OP
OP
biggs682

biggs682

Itching to get back on my bike's
Location
Northamptonshire
[QUOTE 2565276, member: 9609"]Just to clarify - you have saved £22 over the two months; £11 per month for the months with the longest daytime hours and the bluest sky months for decades does not sound all that good.

How are you on if you wanted to sell your house, would any potential buyers be able to get a mortgage with someone else's clobber on the roof?[/quote]

they guarantee that they will buy our house and sell it on if we cant sell due to that reason . and we were paying around the £60 a month and now only paying £22 , we were just hoping to save any amount of the household bills . before we were using over 300 kw per month and now its down to 175 kw per month

and we thought we would share our experience with fellow cc'ers .
 

MarkF

Guru
Location
Yorkshire
My lad sells solar panels from a call centre, the claims are garbage, 50% saving, guaranteed! The solar panel industry needs subsidies (specific taxes), without them it would not be a viable business.............others are paying for your "saving".
 

Cheddar George

oober member
I purchased my panels over a year ago and the payback will be 7 - 8 years based on the first years figures (which wasn't a great summer). They are required by law to use the government figures when they make their pitch, these are very conservative. In saying that my house is perfectly orientated, situated in the south of the UK with mostly clear views to the horizon, so with the full 4Kw installation and a quality inverter it is probably the quickest likely payback that is achievable.
 

Cheddar George

oober member
[QUOTE 2566075, member: 9609"]To achieve this are you being very diligent and using stuff like washing machines, dishwashers, vacuum cleaners etc during the day? From what I could gather; to get value from these things you must use the electric they generate yourself. I studied my electric use over a month and we use next to nothing during the day, and bollocks all on nice days when the sun is shinning. hence my estimated payback time of 12+ years. With all the best intentions of setting things up on timers, I reckon we would soon go back to using power when it most suited us.[/quote]

The saving on our electricity bill is of little consequence, the big money comes from the "Feed In Tariff", 45 pence for every KWH generated, we can then use that KWH or sell it back (about 3 pence).

At the end of the day it was just the government throwing money at a problem to try and reach targets.
 

Cheddar George

oober member
[QUOTE 2566135, member: 9609"]Its down to less than 15p now. Which means using it as it is generated (saving 14.5p per unit) is of all importance, as the selling it back to the grid at something like 3p is too great a loss.[/quote]

Quite right, for installations after early 2012 you will need to work hard and smart to make it pay if you are buying the panels. Fortunately we got on the scheme/gravy train at the right time.
 

MarkF

Guru
Location
Yorkshire
They are required by law to use the government figures when they make their pitch, these are very conservative.

Many companies do nothing of the sort, I have seen my lad's telephone script, it states quite clearly a 50% saving on your electric bill, that is nonsense.

At the end of the day it was just the government throwing money at a problem to try and reach targets.

The government doesn't have any money, it's throwing "our" money, raised by a specific taxation, at an industry that wouldn't be viable without it.
 
Top Bottom