North Facing Solar Panels - a Waste of Money? June Data proves they are worth it.
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- čas přidán 4. 07. 2024
- Big thanks to Dorset Solar Solutions Ltd for an excellent installation. Definitely give them a call if you're in the Hampshire/Dorset area, let them know that you've seen my videos!
www.dorsetsolarsolutions.co.uk/
g.co/kgs/RJPVJw1
Here are the numbers for you to chew over!
You're welcome to make up your own mind and let me know in the comments!
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My Setup
Sunsynk 8.8kW Inverter
Longi HiMo 6 430w Panels x 22
16 on NW aspect and 6 on SE aspect
No battery storage - Věda a technologie
Regarding home battery, i see it as an opportunity to take yourself out of the peak time thereby reducing the stress on the grid. It as many people got a battery, grid peaks could be a thing of the past and the less grid infrastructure is required
Yes. I do the same with my battery so it is helping with carbon intensity - less gas peak power plant usage.
Me too.
Great point!
More west facing arrays would help with this too for many months of the year.
16 panels on the NW aspect really come into play during that peak evening period at the moment.
We'll see how long that lasts as we head into autumn and winter.
I’ve got batteries and by having them I am able to use time of day tariffs such as Octopus Agile that wouldn’t be practical without. It also means I can use my stored solar in the later evening before the rates start to fall. You don’t need a lot of battery storage to be able to do this, for much of the winter I had only 4.2kW of usable battery storage and high demand with the ASHP - the storage we did have meant we avoided most of the peak Agile import rate.
So a bit of battery storage is good, adding lots doesn’t make a lot of financial sense especially as rates are falling
@@geoffreycoan rates will go gack up again in October!
Really valuable podcast on the north facing panels, i'll certainly be forwarding on links to this.
As a home battery owner, i got through last winter paying never more than minimum rate by getting by on the power imported always between 2am & 5am.
In my 2nd year of solar & battery use now, my ROI would've been
You're right about the costs of batteries. We're only at the beginning of the returns from massive scaling up of production. It's only a matter of time before batteries fall below their usage costs for home. Then the benefits will be financial as well as grid carbon intensity reduction.
Thank you for sharing!
Great video as always. My system went live last Friday and happy so far (although very wet and gloomy today). Have the same inverter as you with 18 Aiko 445w panel (oddly the data sheets for Aiko and Longi look suspiciously similar) and have 8 on the East roof, 5 South and 5 North. The roof at the back is actually a "double peak" roof so the panels are actually over 4 faces in a 3S,2N,2S,3N configuration.
Best day so far was Saturday 29th June and hit 47.8kWh and that was with the scaffold till up so think we lost a bit on the East panels. Originally wanted Tigo's all round but decided to drop the East ones so just have them on the N/S ones due to the odd configurating and shading issues. The East ones will have next to no shading and reading up more on modern panels they now have 2-3 bi-pass diodes in them anyway so I think other than for data gathering there is little benefit now days in optimisers or possibly Micro inverters as you can cover 1/3 of the panels and they still kick out power even without any fancy add ons. The data geek in me really wanted them but for nearly £400 extra I couldn't really justify it, especially seeing how little they have done for you, so big thanks in helping make that decision!
I added the Fogstar 15.5kWh battery and it's a great buffer for going into the evening/morning (but that might be as I'm not on the export tariff yet!). I think we are heavier on the elec usage than yourself using 6000kWh for the house and 3000kWh EV and thats with gas oven and boiler. The system I have should produce 5500kWh a year. If you can export far more than you use to cover off any peak usage then I guess the extra outlay is a little harder to justify. But I got the battery for £2250 (client supply so that was with VAT) so think in the grand scheme it's negligible really if you are a high user and adds maybe 6-12 months to the payback. All in mine was £11,750 so very close to you, plus the battery. Am already thinking of how to add another 10 panels on a pergola and another battery in preparation for the switch to ASHP and elec cooking 😅
All good things!
You rightly point out that higher consumption levels will warrant battery storage more readily!
You keep saying North Facing in the video titles, but the NW and SE make a huge difference. My E/W facing panels are 7.56kWh and produced 832.1kWh35% to home, 1% to powerwall and 64% to the grid. Total home use was 1098.1kWh but that is almost all at night rate of 7 pence. That also included 197.41kWh of EV charging also done overnight. My battery was filling up overnight and allowing more solar to be sent to the grid and being paid 15 pence per kWh.
You had a good month, last June we made 1305kWh, this June 1227 kWh. We exported 1047 kWh, and Octopus paid us £217, we imported 528 kWh, and we paid £82 + standing charges. 8.74kWp system various directions and pitch. About to go and order another 12 panels for our NWW roof, have 3 on order for our SSW rear wall. Should all come together in the next couple of months. Induction hob arrives today to replace our gas hob.
That sounds brilliant.
I guess the various directions really helps to flatten your generation curve?
@@UpsideDownFork I have trouble getting my head around which way my panels are pointing, but now I've found a nice compass image with 16 points labelled. On the house I have 2kWp pointing ESE, 2kWp pointing SSW, both at a pitch of 30 degrees. On the garage I have 2.37kWp point ESE and 2.37kWp point WNW, all at 10 degree's pitch. The 12 new panels (5.22kWp) will go on the main house at WNW 30 degrees pitch, and another 3 (1.575kWp) on the rear wall facing SSW at 84 degree pitch. I do get a later generation on the more westerly facing panels, definitely different curves on all the strings. The original roof system is Solaredge so I can see curves for each panel, I can even see the dip caused by the boiler flue, which should be going next year BUS grant permitting.
Wow, awesome figures, up north we were about 18% down on last year. Just imagine what you'll achieve on a good year.
Yes, I am anxious to see a really good solar month! 😁
I really like your videos 😀 challenging the status quo with considered real world data. Nice. Octopus tariffs/cheaper electric = no battery for you makes complete sense. It does mean dependency on outside factors of course, but I’d do the same in your shoes. My battery/solar (& current lack of approved feedin) means my battery enables max use of my solar & minimal ‘loss’ to grid. Along with strategic ev charging in daytime. If cloud cover drops my solar (frequently in NW) my battery prevents peak grid use dipping, which mounts up. Same for HP on shoulder seasons. I do like the independence enhancement but a virtual battery Octopus tariff definitely less upfront investment. PS just did 5k mile road trip across Europe & around Norway in Tesla, easy magic cheap! Fallen back in love with road trips now using electric!
Agreed. EV is definitely a big factor that can make a home battery extremely worthwhile.
Brilliant results! And apparently it wasn't the best June either!
We managed 1.4mw up north in Leeds! 10kw SolarEdge + 24.6kwh Givenergy battery's.
Our first June ever with this system.
Best day 72.7kwh worst day 22.8kwh.
Solar to grid: 950kwh. Battery to grid 436kwh
Grid to home(off peak) : 313kwh. Grid to battery: 509kwh
Octopus paid us £212, we paid them £65
Current strategy is selling as much as possible to build up credit for winter. So, still do as much as we can during off peak including car, laundry etc (11:30pm to 5:30am👍
Excellent result! Especially for rainy Leeds! 😉(My sister lives there and loves it)
The more I watch the co2/kwh change through the day makes me realise the environmental impact a battery could have. Going off grid at the dirtiest part of the day. And also export as much as you can at this time. This does not make financial sense but significant boost to fossil fuel reduction.
Just putting in enough to cover your own loads is great already. Grid operators need battery storage that can be precisely controlled to make it all perfectly balanced. That should he done at a larger scale for optimal use of the Lithium reserves. Just figure out what you would need to cover the nights in summer but first get more solar panels if you have some roof space left.
Covering the entire NE roof makes my home energy independent for 8 months a year with only about 4 kWh of battery storage and also really helps to cover the base load of the home in mediocre weather conditions.
the financial and carbon benefits are actually pretty well associated with each other
A really great point.
More west facing arrays would also help this issue for many months of the year.
Best way to tell if temps are effecting your panels (drill into the string voltages in the sunsynk app by going to Equipment > Click on your inverter > Input and select choose the day and select Vpv. Compare that to cooler days and i bet the voltage is lower
Great tip! I just had a quick look. If you just skim over the figures and graphs then you will easily miss the difference. But, I'm seeing very roughly a 10 volt drop when there is a 10 degree ambient temp increase.
@@UpsideDownFork if for example the string voltage is 400v as apposed to 410v and you have 10A current then that's a 100w difference In power.
I have ground mounted panels and using the hose pipe on a 5kw south array at 1pm last week (when it was 26c outside) yeiled a rise of 300w. But ground mounted panels usually run cooler than roof mounted due to more air flow behind them
Good set of results. We generated 1750kWh in June and exported 1156kWh on East/West panels. We get great long solar days but on sunny days we often see the grid peaking well above 260V resulting in one of our inverters throttling back before restarting again. I had the DNO turn the grid tap down last year and it is much better than it was, but I know this is throttling is affecting our generation - something to consider if you are planning a large array.
Looking at my ASHP hot water consumption in May vs June it was almost identical, June was just 2kW down on May so we didn’t see any noticeable benefits of the tank temp being warmer. Interesting that you saw a big reduction.
Thanks for commenting.
There is some difference between our water heating but some of the HP consumption should be attributed to space heating at the beginning of May.
Excellent solar results for you!
I must have watched this video 4 times, beginning to end. Some excellent content. Thank you for the effort.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Acid test whether batteries are worth it is after a winter, particularity one which provides little sunshine.. also if you have an ev or two, as we have.
how do you export back to the grid if the dcc can’t provide a smart meter connection
Ouch, is that because of signal connection issues?
I think in those situations you have to provide export meter readings but you can't benefit from the great smart tariffs.
Great video again. It'd be nice to see a day with the profiles for the north and south strings, so can see the change in which provides the most power. Could the temperature of the north panels be the reason for their increased output? Can you compare the temps with your IR camera for north and south.
I've been trying to dig into all the custom reports and other settings to produce a nice graph that shows both strings together but I haven't yet cracked how to do that. on my sunsynk inverter. Apparently givenergy inverters can display that quite easily?
I don't believe that the temperature differs, but I will attempt to take some measurements.
When I looked before, the panels start coolish, just above ambient air temp but within 5-10 minutes they are already very warm. So the NW facing panels may have a slight efficiency advantage but it would be incredibly short lived.
At 3:20 I think your graph should be labeled Heat Generated, not Heat Pump Consumption. My HP used 1351 kWh in January and it was way colder here.
Apologies if I didn't make it clear.
Blue bars are electricity consumed and purple bars are heat generated.
The title may be misleading, but the legend at the bottom is correct.
Thanks for pointing this out.
LOL first advert after was for Hershal infra red panels......... ouch
😂 the targeting is on point!
Is all your data input to the spreadsheets manually or do the apps allow data export via CSV?
Unfortunately most of it is manual input. 🫣
@@UpsideDownFork Something you can put o them as a request for a download function
@@rtfazeberdee3519 To be more specific, the Octopus data is easy to download and process. The Sunsynk and Tigo data is the bit I struggle with. Searching online, others have overcome this with modbus and home assistant. But that whole process will end up being more time consuming than manually inputting the number.
@@UpsideDownFork Thanks for clarifying
Our co2 reduction was way off on our solax inverter. After a lot of digging I found where to change the grams co2/kwh. Its a fix number so just an estimate as the point we produce max power is the greenest part of the day. But at least its a better guess. Might be able to find the setting on your inverter.
Thanks, I did have a look a while ago and you prompted me to have another thorough look last night. Can't locate a setting equivalent to that sadly.
@@UpsideDownFork hard wired to the emissions of the chineese grid!
@@joewentworth7856 It's even worse than that.
2023 grid emission averages.
UK - 162gCO2/kWh = 715kg saved
China - 582gCO2/kWh = 2569kg saved
Sunsynk app - 4401kg saved.
That's the equivalent of almost 1kg/kWh of grid emissions.
I should probably delete that slide from use in future videos.
@@UpsideDownFork 1kg/kwh is for the worst coal power. i guess the theory goes that the coal is the first fuel to be turned down with plentiful renewables. but not in the UK where its normally gas, so it should not be based on the average intensity either but 1kg/kwh is going to make some very hopeful figures. the real calculation must be really complex, as the value is constantly changing.
Most days in the UK have cloud cover. When that happens orientation isn't that important. On the full sun days the additional input from an expanded array isn't really needed. The real reason to have north solar is in winter when it will massively improve your cloudy weather performance.
Thats pretty much what I am seeing with my N/S panels. On a typical cloudy days the daily output of the panels are withing 50-150w of each other, it's only been on the one really sunny day I've had the panels the south ones have produced 45% more than the North ones. Have only had them a week so can't draw a full conclusion but seems inline with his findings so far.
Yep, the diffused light situation has been a factor since February but there has been a shift towards the orientations generating a closer amount per panel and that has been due to the high sun in the sky throughout June.
Instead of the sun moving around the building, it now moves over the building if that makes sense.
I'm wondering on the effect of clouds on the effectiveness of your north facing panels.
Think of it like a photographer, when there are no clouds the light travels in a straight line from the sun to your roof. However when the light goes through a cloud it would scatter the light in different directions.
So on a cloudy day would the direction of the panel be less important?
There are more cloudy days in winter and more cloudy days in the UK.
Would it make sense for you to install solar panels on your driveway? (Like solar roadway type of thing, so you would be driving your car and walking on the panels themselves.) Or vertical solar with your garden fence?
Yes, the diffused light days almost completely equalise the power generation between the two aspects.
The sun being so high in the sky also has a big effect at this time of year.
I've seen some people starting to replace fence panels with solar and it seems like a good solution if you have the right scenario for it!
@@UpsideDownFork cool.
Well the winter has the more cloudy days than summer, so I hope it's still equalized when the sun is lower.
Great video! Do you know how your 83% figure (NW as % of SE) varies by month? My guess is that NW is closer to SE in summer and further away in winter. We also got solar at the end of January, all SE facing. Our total system capacity is about half what yours is (5mW vs 9.5mW). In February we generated about 70% of what you did, despite our total capacity only being around 50% of yours. In June, however, we generated about 50% of what you did. We have a bit of shading which affects us in mid-summer, but it looks like in summer your NW panels aren't far off performing as well as your SE ones, but in February they lag behind a bit more. Does that match your data?
Yes, exactly!
The sun being so high in the sky has made a big difference.
I was anticipating it to be the other way. I speculated that diffused light would equalise the panels throughout the winter, but I was wrong.
As reducing our emissions is more effective than capturing them, we are better off implementing lower carbon tech (heat pumps/A2A/heat networks, solar and EVs), voting for it and evangelising it (talking about it/sharing videos as you do) and only then capturing it temporarily in trees!
Agreed. We need to tackle all of these areas, as much as we can in our sphere of influence!
With reference to heat pump
Can u do a video about heating feels compared to boiler as in not as hot
But how hot etc and how long to get hot / warm .
As seriously thinking of getting valiant HP with solar etc
One thing I might guess is it runs a lot lot longer but u get a more constant feel
And how hot is in rooms
And in a room with a door shut to keep heat in room etc.
As currently got 18kw Worcester Bosch
Condensing boiler shut lounge diner door to stop heat going upstairs
Boiler on 20-30 mins
And lounge get really warm 23-24 deg c
Stays warm all evening but obviously the rest of house gets colder can often last all evening.
Just very curious of how it work differently
Thanks in advance
@@Mark-sw5zi I've covered this in previous videos but yes you're thinking along the right track.
The house is more comfortable. It remains a consistent temperature and doesn't have hot or cold spots.
Because of it running longer, it builds up thermal mass so things like our leather sofa don't feel cold to sit on in the winter any more.
It's hard to describe but it's a very warm and comfortable environment throughout our house now.
Thanks for the info
One question
What was your annual usage
Before solar heat pump installed
Elec & gas please
Actually 2 ???
Then what was electricity use for house with heat pump running
And obviously then not using gas
As going to have similar size house
Which 1986 heating system single rads
With a early 2000,s condensing boiler
Which really needs replacing
With the figures then can do an kWh
Consumption estimate for the solar
Thanks again
@@Mark-sw5zi hello, I think the best way to answer that with more context is to watch this video.
czcams.com/video/GM2MCaYyaHE/video.html
If I've missed something then please let me know.
June down hear in Devon weather was poor for the month we have 8 panels East and 10 panels West 0n the house so 7.5 of panels target for the month was 899Kwh we made 940Kwh. we exported 465Kwh and used 219Kwh and put 244Kwh into the battery's. so a cost of power save of £125 and a £70 for the export plus the hot water for the month off the solar so only the gas standing charge for the month so a save of about £12 for a non heating month so for the month £207 total for the month on that system. The second Diy solar setup on the workshop hear is 2.5kw of panels that made about 320Kwh for the month used and battery out there 190Kw exported 130Kwh so a save an export of £71 off that so total for both of £278. Battery on a home system like you say is very close call now as if its worth it or not 6k of my install on the house is the battery cost its a alot more to get back
You can get a 15kWh battery for £2500 now, two cables and data cable and it's connected to a lot of inverters.
Sounds like a good result over all!
@@TheRonskiman
Which battery is that pal?
@@serraios1989 Google Fogstar, they are a UK company and supply a variety of batteries, when I built my own batteries i bought my cells from them. If you're willing to buy from China it can be even cheaper to DIY build.
Electricty prices are being raised again in October..
@@MikeGleesonazelectrics should be a small uplift. 🤞
Last month I imported 100.53 kWh for £12.12 on Octopus Agile so 12p per kWh vs your 15p per kWh (I heard you say 116 kWh for £17.38) so my battery avoided 3p per kWh of costs. The battery is helpful but, as noted last month, unless my battery lasts much longer than expected, 3p per kWh is below my estimated battery usage costs.
Perhaps in the winter it'll be more favourable but at the moment, not so much. The last few days have allowed me to use electricity for nothing though, owing to price plunges, so we'll see.
Good security though?
@@UpsideDownFork Yes, but power cuts are pretty rare in my part of London.
@@jchidley Same here. I guess there is also the security against potential price rises.
planting trees is like trying to stop an overflowing bath with sponges
The simplest solution is to turn off the tap...
Arrest all volcanoes
@@onlyme972
Good luck with that, but there are easier ways of reducing CO2 emissions
"Humanity's annual carbon emissions through the burning of fossil fuels and forests, etc., are 40 to 100 times greater than all volcanic emissions"
Oh, don't spoil my fun! 😉
Ignorance is bliss.
I like trees for shade too.
Plant more trees whilst doing all the other things to help reduce emissions.
As Tesco says "every little helps"
I really want to see someone use the cold side of the heat pump to keep their solar array cool and increase the solar efficiency
Nibe PVT ground source heat pumps run brine to the solar to cool the panels. With air source you'd need to have the heat pump running and duct the cooler air to the solar. Air also has a lower specific heat capacity than water. So I think all in, it is unlikely to be worthwhile?
@@Biggest-hz7ng I’ve gone for a gshp with a diy install, so I’m just thinking of all the exciting things I can do with the cold side water. Maybe a cold larder, a bath water heat recovery system, cooling for solar panels… the possibilities are endless.
@@dominicgoodwin1147 you can do all of these things, the problem is chasing diminishing returns and the maintenance of complex systems, if I have to pay a plumber to come out once to unblock my bath heat recovery system, well that's a decades of savings gone.
I'm sure we will see more integrated systems like these as the technologies and their implementation continues to mature.
Enjoy your content but please stop saying battles are not worth it ! Because of our battles we import nothing from May to October unless as has been the case over the last few days Agile is 0.00 or - cost when we export the power in the batteries and charge them from the grid exporting all of our generation. Our batteries also mean we can export in the winter in the saver sessions earring us well over £100 last winter. We earn money in the summer which gives us way more credit than we use in the winter allowing us a nice £300 withdrawal from our octopus account in May which also has a very healthy credit balance which looks like we’ll be able to withdraw another few hundred pounds before the winter. The batteries earn us hundreds a year, putting cash in our pocket not just credit to be used in the winter. The batteries gave us an overall import cost of 9p kWh last winter on the agile tariff. Our payback period went up by a year and a half by adding batteries. We also get the odd power cut which I know many don’t but it’s great not having the inconvenience of no power. We have a solar system a little smaller than yours but not facing North, 20kwh usable of batteries and a Heat Pump.
I don't think @UpsideDownFork is going to change his mind, as he did a whole video on why batteries weren't cost effective for his family given solar export rates (under a 5% return). And @timandkatsgreenwalk did a similar video on extra batteries for themselves (they do already have 13kWh if I recall correctly). If export rates worsen, then maybe the economics might change. Coping with outages is a good reason to have them, though.
Apologies that I don't take the time to cover all the nuances and various scenarios.
My approach is always that data is power when making these decisions.
If you've crunched the numbers and it is financially viable or beneficial for you then that's great.
For some people it may not make financial sense but they may do it for other reasons, energy independence or reducing grid emissions. Still good.
I guess my main point is that there isn't a one size fits all solution. I'm trying something different and so far it is working for me, with my energy consumption and generation, but my circumstances will certainly be different to 90% of people out there.
Hopefully they give everyone some pause for thought and the comments is a great place for people to share their various scenarios which can also help others!
Apologies once again if I come across as too dismissive about batteries in general. Maybe a little confirmation bias slipping in subconsciously!
June is a resonably good month for solar, but for four months of the year, solar is dismal. Essentially solar is a false source of power as we need the reliable generators as well. The cost of running these essential generators is higher because of renewable input and that is added to our electrcity bill. The grid system is far more complex finacially than most realise. What should also be appreciated that although renewables can generate electrcity it is inferior and not a replacement for conventional genertaion. Apart from intermittency (Which batteries cannot compensate for), they lack technical inputs as well such as inertia and reactive power.
It's a problem for the generator companies, can they charge enough to cover the cost of their plants - staff need paying all year around. However, we have always had a need for variable amounts of generation, more batteries in peoples homes and overnight charging are starting to flatten the demand curve, so I only think its an issue for older style coal power generators and possibly nuclear, for a modern gas plant its meant to be used on-demand.
The biggest issue I believe is expectations, people feel very entitled that they should get electricity at 25p/kwh in the middle of a freezing January when perhaps the true cost is much higher and they've not been contributing for most of the year.
@@edc1569 The point you are missing I think, is that these conventional generators are essential and without them there would be a shortfall at times. This has to be paid for and the consumer loses out. They would be more economical if there were no renewables and we would have cheaper electricity. Batteries are no answer and are an illusion that some believe can overcome intermittency.
@@edc1569
The short answer is that the true cost of offshore wind turbines is 7.3p/kWh (as set last November by UK Gov), onshore and Solar PV is cheaper.
@@iareid8255
Centrica will be using 300MWh compressed air storage driving 50MW generators as one of their solutions moving away from polluting fossil fuels.
"Centrica plc announces a strategic partnership and £70 million investment in Highview Power and its first clean energy storage project in Carrington, Manchester.
Centrica’s investment will be a key part of a £300 million funding package to develop the first commercial-scale Liquid Air Energy Storage plant in the UK, which will boost the UK’s energy security and accelerate the transition to net zero. "
Oh, don't spoil my fun! 😉