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Solar Panels UK - is it worth it?
- Thread starter jdwuk
- Start date
phil4
Member
How did you a) prevent export and b) persuade the DNO that you had done that?
Knowing my luck, it's this or downsize my plans drastically, so would be keen to know.
Thanks
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
Installer's responsibility (AFAIK)
I'm surprised that DNO refused, rather than saying "Export restriction required" ... maybe it is all down to the way that the installer asks the question ...
phil4
Member
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
Ah, sorry about that. Hope it turns out OK.
DNO took months to approve my latest expansion. I was a bit fed up with installer that they hadn't offered the DNO "no additional export" to speed things up (maybe wouldn't have made any difference ...)
As it happens they approved it all, which was a surprise to me. Current 16 panels, 2x PowerWall and Car charger. Adding further 32 panels and another charger ... pretty sure the skinny cable I have feeding the house (that's another story ...) isn't up to exporting the lot ... not that I'm intending to export anything, 2nd car charger's job is to trickle charge a car if we ever get to the point of having any excess
I heard that there is an offer for free? / cheapie upgrade to 3-Phase for oldies like me. When I last asked 3-Phase upgrade was well into 5 figures monopoly-price and I could almost spit the distance the nearest 3-phase pole is from the house
If 3-Phase is actually an available bunce I ought to do that. Future proofing etc.
RedMod3
Member
When the installer commissions the Powerwall, they set a flag in the configuration to prevent export from the PW; I saw the guy set mine so I am 100% G100 Compliant with no export. Users cannot change the configuration, and if they did, the installer/user would get in big trouble.
For info, my 16 panels are 250W each and the inverter are 9 years old, and we generate 4.3MWh per year netting £950 per year from FIT.
After adding 4 extra 375W panels and a Powerwall, we have spent £13 on power over the past week, we are all-electric, this is in line with my spreadsheet that justified the spend, including the 2nd PW that is due in June, and which I need operational for late Autumn-early Spring.
PITA
Model 3 Performance
We're authorised for 10kW (2 powerwalls) and 5kW (Solar Inverter)... but only 5kW export. Plus recently accepted for another second 22kW Ev charger.
So I've never seen our Powerwalls exporting to the Grid... they're storage batteries for my own use, why would they be exporting to the Grid??
I've had Solar excess exporting to the Grid, but that won't happen this year because the Ev's will soak it up.
So I've never seen our Powerwalls exporting to the Grid... they're storage batteries for my own use, why would they be exporting to the Grid??
I've had Solar excess exporting to the Grid, but that won't happen this year because the Ev's will soak it up.
@phil4 The installer did it in his application to the DNO
my original installation of 7kW PV was permitted by my DNO.
the first PW wasn’t allowed to export and was capped to 3.4. When the second was installed both we’re uncapped. As far as I know it’s just a setting in the gateway that prevents export. The newer panels are on a solar edge inverter. There is a setting somewhere that shuts them down when 200Wh+ is being exported by the main panels. The new ones don’t shut completely and show gen at 189Wh on my home display but zero on the solar edge app.
I believe the Powerwall gateway is the overall controller.
I’ll ask my installer for the info
my displays from just now are below
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@phil4 My installer replied to my email thus:
I’ve never known them to refuse anything, but they may apply some export limitations which for most people isn’t an issue. We deal with UK power here so for somewhere else it will be different company but I can’t imagine they would be that different in their approach.
I’d suggest that you talk to your DNO direct and explain that your proposal will be set not to export and therefore will not impact grid limitations
I’ve never known them to refuse anything, but they may apply some export limitations which for most people isn’t an issue. We deal with UK power here so for somewhere else it will be different company but I can’t imagine they would be that different in their approach.
I’d suggest that you talk to your DNO direct and explain that your proposal will be set not to export and therefore will not impact grid limitations
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
'Coz (in my dreams) you'll be a Peaker-Plant and collecting the payment premium when you help the grid out by exporting when they have that need (or establishing the grid frequency), and if you could figure out a way they'd be paying you to top up your battery to save them having to pay Nortth Sea Wind to curtail
You could do that by having Tesla provide you juice - 12p per unit, same for import as export, 24/7
Sadly that's doubtful
Pains me that even though I have a very eco house, and strenuous efforts of the family to be "green", we have a number of servers running here 24/7 ... my base load is 1.5kW We have some more roof space which we will likely populate (once I have seen some actual generation figures vs. load).Nope, not mining BitCoin ....
We also have two lots of Solar Thermal - one for domestic hot water, the other for a pool. The pool one has been temperamental since day one, and actually (benefit of hindsight) I wish I had done PV and Heat Pump instead. When solar thermal working properly pool is too hot in summer, and needs some top-up from another heat source start/end of season. With PV I could run the heat pump, or just "use" the electricity instead - and then just use Electricity for the start/end of the season. With Solar Thermal I need the excess heat to go somewhere.
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
My installer said the same, but he wouldn't entertain the thought of fitting the panels, and then commissioning them, once the DNO eventually approved (with/without export cap) on the grounds that "They might refuse" ... I just wanted to get on with the job ...
phil4
Member
That's pretty much what my installer (I call them that, they've not actually installed anything) comes across as. They've suggested that the proposed setup needs a DNO application in advance, and suggested getting their permission also in advance. Not even had a site visit yet.
Its a good job I'm not in a hurry, as I reckon I'd get good odds on this taking well over a year.
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
I was told DNO has a "must reply" of 45 days, or something like that. They actually took months ... with installer chasing them regularly. Installer didn't do anything to initiate contact with DNO until they had my deposit, in full ... and they didn't invoice me for that until we had ironed out some details of how the implementation would be. Must opportunity-cost was lost in the process ...
I would have much preferred (benefit of hindsight) that they had charged me a fee to do the DNO contact / paperwork, and that that was initiated at the earliest opportunity. As it then turned out they had my deposit for 6 months or so ... not through their own fault, per se, but it doesn't sit well with me.
Hopefully that will help someone else to cause things to go more quickly
phil4
Member
There's the good news, I've paid them £100 to do the DNO application. So that's at least square. Thanks for the headsup on the 45 days, albeit I doubt it'll happen.
I won't lay this squarely at the DNO though, I suspect solar installers are completely overstretched at the moment, and the one I've asked to do the DNO stuff is almost certainly quite happy it taking ages. In that regard, considering the cost, it's a really sorry state of affairs.
And that's before I get onto my thinkin of the DNO as some sort of cartel who would rather you didn't send them your excess juice as that interrupts their power generation game, and removes an element of their control.
I'm a really grumpy cynical person
I won't lay this squarely at the DNO though, I suspect solar installers are completely overstretched at the moment, and the one I've asked to do the DNO stuff is almost certainly quite happy it taking ages. In that regard, considering the cost, it's a really sorry state of affairs.
And that's before I get onto my thinkin of the DNO as some sort of cartel who would rather you didn't send them your excess juice as that interrupts their power generation game, and removes an element of their control.
I'm a really grumpy cynical person
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
Yup, DNO failing to look over its shoulder to see Musky creeping up on them with an army of lovies all with a PowerWall or two each and happy to let him have all their exports to play with. All that huge investment in Peaker Plants, which has been lining their pocket every time there was a failure somewhere on the grid and had been enabling them to step in and pick up the significant penalty payments. Gas Turbine not stabilising the grid within a few milliseconds, unlike Musky's grid-wide collection of batteries which now get the cash because they get there first.
In case of interest I found this article an interesting read on the benefits of the Battery which Tesla installed in Australia in 2017 when Musk went on twitter to announce "We'll install in 100 days, or you ca have it for free" - at the time it was 3x bigger than the largest battery in the world (actually completed in under 2 months)
At that time Australia was the world’s largest coal exporter; the sunniest continent; plenty of hydro / wind opportunity; yet South Australia had the highest electricity prices in the world and regular blackouts because of insufficient generating capacity / lack of fault-tolerance to go with the huge bills. Complacent Peaker-Plant owners over there also failing to look over their shoulder
That had a windfall during commission when a major coal powered power station failed, and the battery stepped in ahead of the peaker-plants. And then a tornado (2020 I think) took out a section of pylons on the interconnect with Victoria - main source of imported energy to that region. That had happened a few years earlier too - huge disruption and blackouts. The government commandeered (if that's the right word) the Hornsdale battery for a couple of weeks whilst the pylons were rebuilt. There was another interconnector, not sufficient to run the whole state, but they topped up the battery on their 4-hour Octopus Go
tariff and smoothed the load during the day. Payments provided a one-off profit of US$18M Seems that the speed with which battery stabilises the grid has up'd the competition, and that has driven down the price of payments when that happens - saving the bill payers something like $40M a year ... all good I reckon.
You're in good company
Yachtsman
Member
I started my quest in early December & only just got a install date of end of April, so don’t hold your breath.
HenryT
Active Member
Are there any Solis inverter users amongst the solar/battery users here?
The reason I ask is that I am having a recurring problem with mine and wonder if my experience is typical.
The system was installed in Jan by EEC (based in Southport) and includes 8 panels producing just under 3 kWp and 8.2 kWh Pylon battery. It runs fine so far as I can tell, and has reduced reliance on high cost grid electricity to zero on some days, given the battery charging overnight and topped up via solar. The problem is with the datalogger.
From around mid-Feb the data reported by the datalogger has become patchy (on/off, on/off) with hours reporting nothing then back to life again. There is a good wifi signal all the while, and even during the outages the datalogger is still broadcasting its IP address and can be logged onto. The inverter is still operating as it should and the data is still visible on the screen on the inverter itself throughout, just not broadcasting to the app/website. The inverter is in the garage so a bit of a pain to go outside and check).
I reported this to the installer who have been useless (I have had other problems with them before, so approached them again on this with a heavy heart), deflecting, deferring, fobbing me off, insisting I need to speak to the manufacturer. In an effort to get the matter resolved I did speak to the manufacturer who to be fair to them did engage and have provided a replacement datalogger. The new datalogger worked fine for the first couple of hours, then stopped again. Same routine - IP address is visible, datalogger is 'reachable' but doesn't want to broadcast data consistently, if at all.
Image below is typical and is from last night showing the point the new datalogger fell over for the second time.
The reason I ask is that I am having a recurring problem with mine and wonder if my experience is typical.
The system was installed in Jan by EEC (based in Southport) and includes 8 panels producing just under 3 kWp and 8.2 kWh Pylon battery. It runs fine so far as I can tell, and has reduced reliance on high cost grid electricity to zero on some days, given the battery charging overnight and topped up via solar. The problem is with the datalogger.
From around mid-Feb the data reported by the datalogger has become patchy (on/off, on/off) with hours reporting nothing then back to life again. There is a good wifi signal all the while, and even during the outages the datalogger is still broadcasting its IP address and can be logged onto. The inverter is still operating as it should and the data is still visible on the screen on the inverter itself throughout, just not broadcasting to the app/website. The inverter is in the garage so a bit of a pain to go outside and check).
I reported this to the installer who have been useless (I have had other problems with them before, so approached them again on this with a heavy heart), deflecting, deferring, fobbing me off, insisting I need to speak to the manufacturer. In an effort to get the matter resolved I did speak to the manufacturer who to be fair to them did engage and have provided a replacement datalogger. The new datalogger worked fine for the first couple of hours, then stopped again. Same routine - IP address is visible, datalogger is 'reachable' but doesn't want to broadcast data consistently, if at all.
Image below is typical and is from last night showing the point the new datalogger fell over for the second time.
RedMod3
Member
An update on why Solar and a Powerwall is a good idea. We paid £1.05 for power yesterday and while most was free, what we paid for didn’t exceed 5p kWh. We exported nothing.
Attachments
PITA
Model 3 Performance
Nice clean Solar Input there...
Ours was choppy with a few clouds
But still not far off your figures
