Solar on shed roofs

[Fubar]

firstly £28K for a 44Kw install sounds good to me, but check out the inverters and the warranty . They will most likely be Chinese and I would upgrade if possible to Fronius although Solis seem to be behaving well but you cannot rely on extended warranties when you ned to return product to Shanghai for checking out!
I think you are optimistic on your 12p figure, while that was last ten years an export of nearer 6.5- 7 p would be more realistic. however it is quite possible that high prices are here to stay but currently an average would be 10p today.
East West panels would and should give you a slight premium though as they produce a better production profile except of course you lose out in winter
my own figures would suggest a new 44K system would produce in the order of 37,500 units in the Eastern counties provided there is no shading
Sadly as you rightly note you will lose out on your production as 75% of production will be April - September which is opposite to your usage cycle
you are correct, you will get days in winter when production falls off the cliff, my 144Kw array has produced a total of 126 Kwh over 4 days 2nd-5th this week ie 32.5Kw per day avg. Back up to 218 units yesterday though but today is not looking good
My 2 east and west arrays both 40 kw did 6 and 7 kWh out puts on 2 days this week

depending on the house it would be very easy to reduce its consumption to near zero. my house array is 8kw and with my 19kw of batteries my consumption from the grid is very low and also at this time of year I am taking power from the grid on cheap rate to supplement when the sun does not shine
You will normally require a HH meter to sell your export, this can be a faff to obtain and will cost approximately £350-400 per annum
I am assuming you have 3 phase already as you Weill not normally get permission to install more than 10Kw otherwise
The other option to consider as well is a ground mount system, then you can face it Due south and get better yields up to around the 44,000 units depends on location

Thank you.
Trina solar vertex panels and solis inverter are quoted.

 

[Grass And Grain]

I've had what I consider a very competitive quote (£28k for a 44 kw system on East/West roof.
Predicted best output of 34500 kw/ year.
Assuming the grid has the capacity to take everything I produce @ lets say 12p, that's an income of £4100 / year(7 year payback).
Is that realistic or too simplistic?
Will i need a HH meter. I know the standing charges for HH meters are ridiculously high. Neither of my neighbours have HH meters for their 50 kw systems.
I met a biomass engineer yesterday who told me solar was not viable without a FIT if I wasn't using most of the generated power myself.
I will obviously be using some of the electricity myself. But of the 65000kw I currently use, the vast majority is required between September and April. Running 2 fridges that draw 80 odd amps between them. They would be obviously be working the hardest in autumn when the potatoes come in and spring when ambient air is warming up. I could put them on a timer to only come on in daytime but I imagine the panels on a dull day in December will produce next to nothing. I'd like to think I'd be generating up to 20% of my requirements so that could be £3 or £4 k a year. The main issue would be if I stopped growing potatoes . My energy needs would fall off a cliff then and nearly all of the solar power would need to be exported.
Most of the other energy requirements are running the grading line, workshop and lighting.
Would a battery be a worthwhile investment? I wonder if i will be able to link the battery to the house if the farm wasn't needing much power in the summer. Forgive me but I am not at all familiar with how it all works.
We used to have a generator that would power the both farm and the house during power cuts by flicking a switch.

On another note, I read somewhere that govt solar grants may be coming soon so maybe I should hold off for an announcement.
What is the grid going to do with all of this solar produced energy. It seems to have the same problem as me. Maximum production/ minimum requirement in summer and maximum requirement/ minimum production in winter.

Remember to knock off income tax from the sales/income, before calculating payback.

firstly £28K for a 44Kw install sounds good to me, but check out the inverters and the warranty . They will most likely be Chinese and I would upgrade if possible to Fronius although Solis seem to be behaving well but you cannot rely on extended warranties when you ned to return product to Shanghai for checking out!
I think you are optimistic on your 12p figure, while that was last ten years an export of nearer 6.5- 7 p would be more realistic. however it is quite possible that high prices are here to stay but currently an average would be 10p today.
East West panels would and should give you a slight premium though as they produce a better production profile except of course you lose out in winter
my own figures would suggest a new 44K system would produce in the order of 37,500 units in the Eastern counties provided there is no shading
Sadly as you rightly note you will lose out on your production as 75% of production will be April - September which is opposite to your usage cycle
you are correct, you will get days in winter when production falls off the cliff, my 144Kw array has produced a total of 126 Kwh over 4 days 2nd-5th this week ie 32.5Kw per day avg. Back up to 218 units yesterday though but today is not looking good
My 2 east and west arrays both 40 kw did 6 and 7 kWh out puts on 2 days this week

depending on the house it would be very easy to reduce its consumption to near zero. my house array is 8kw and with my 19kw of batteries my consumption from the grid is very low and also at this time of year I am taking power from the grid on cheap rate to supplement when the sun does not shine
You will normally require a HH meter to sell your export, this can be a faff to obtain and will cost approximately £350-400 per annum
I am assuming you have 3 phase already as you Weill not normally get permission to install more than 10Kw otherwise
The other option to consider as well is a ground mount system, then you can face it Due south and get better yields up to around the 44,000 units depends on location

Apologies, I'm not very electrically minded.

Would you know how many kW a split phase system would be allowed to connect?

 

[chickens and wheat]

Remember to knock off income tax from the sales/income,

And calculate how much tax can be saved using capital allowances on purchase price.

 

[Grass And Grain]

And calculate how much tax can be saved using capital allowances on purchase price.

Good point.

 

[Exfarmer]

Remember to knock off income tax from the sales/income, before calculating payback.


Apologies, I'm not very electrically minded.

Would you know how many kW a split phase system would be allowed to connect?

It will very much depend on the situation. 10kw whilst the normal limit for single phase I do know of a 30 kw on single but it gave us serious problems next door as the imbalance on phases was burning out my inverters.
i would have thought normally would allow 20.

 

[Fubar]

And calculate how much tax can be saved using capital allowances on purchase price.

Should hopefully have a decent profit this year so I need to invest something that will be tax deductible and will hopefully bring a bit of income in during the lean years.

 

[chickens and wheat]

Might as well, solar income/savings should cover bank loan. So for the first years your cashflow neutral at least, whilst having a tax save in year one.
Then eventually you may get to pay tax on profit.

 

[dod1e]

Any good reputable companies covering aberdeenshire?

Someone to look at the situation and advise best and most efficient set up, taking grants, infrastructure, buildings, future plans etc into account and get everything going without charging over the odds?

TIA

Dod