They don't have to be pointing due south, just facing in a southerly direction. You may lose a few percentage points of power if your roof is not facing exactly south at the optimum angle, but not much. If you decided to have solar hot water panels then even a roof that faced east one side and west the other side need not be a disaster because you'd get maximum power in the morning and evening when you'd need it most.
Solar panel manufacturers quote figures for the “peak power” and “installed capacity” of their products. According to industry standards, these are the amounts of electrical output in watts that they would generate
if one kilowatt per square metre of the sun’s energy were to fall on them. But how close is this to the amount of sunshine at your location?
For most of the latitudes that cover England and Wales, the summer insolation is a fraction of that figure. Even Europe’s sunniest place, Limassol in Cyprus, only gets 325 W per square metre. London gets 198 and Edinburgh 172 in July. In December, the figures are 96, 22 and 13 respectively. So in the winter, it’s a lot less -- and that’s when you need more power because the lights will be on for longer.
The further from the equator you travel, the less sense it makes. It’s not just that the amount of power PV panels produce at this latitude is risible, they also produce it at the wrong time. In hot countries, where air conditioning guzzles electricity, peak demand coincides with peak solar radiation. In the UK, peak demand takes place between 5pm and 7pm on winter evenings. Subjected to one season of wind, rain and snow and they’ll require mending anyway.
The best way to make money from solar power would be by bypassing the solar panels and connecting the incoming wire to the outgoing wire

. By buying electricity for 7p and selling it for 44p (if you sell power to the grid rather than using it yourself, you get an extra 3p), you’ll make a massive profit.
Trees are my solar panels and dead wood is my stored energy. And CO2 feeds more trees.
Every Sunday morning, I spend half an hour or so collecting wood for our solid-fuel burner; I get exercise by doing it, I'm clearing the local verges and the wood (which lasts all week) is all
free !!!

The payback is instant, 'cos the heat warms the house right away. My only outlay is on boxes of matches and on firelighters - far cheaper than solar panels.
This is so efficient in heating our house through the winter months, that our central (oil-fired) heating bills have reduced dramatically.