That is a respectable set of generation figures, given your latitude and roof orientation. Have you noticed that people never query spending the same amount of cash on a holiday that you (wisely) chose to invest in a solar PV system, instead?
They added the force discharge feature to my FoxESS system back in September last year and it was a game changer I took part in 6 saving sessions and managed to get net zero cost (excluding standing charge) for November and December so I had to rethink my ROI calculation
Really interesting information and good advice. After 3 months of operating my system and I'm now in the process of replacing my 2 electric showers by installing an electric hot water tank. Now instead of the system clipping my solar output when my batteries are full, it will switch to heating my hot water. It won't necessarily reduce my overall electrical consumption, but it will definitely reduce the stress and strain on the batteries and the inverter, when the showers are running. Especially on that initial spike which is always best to avoid whenever possible to extend the life of those expensive batteries.
I’m surprised companies do undersell battery capacity. I pushed for 10 and I’m glad I did. 5kwh is totally underpowered and will leave you short, especially in the winter. With DFS and forced export at decent rates, getting at least 10 is a no brainer. The only thing making me question it now, is Octopus Tracker is much cheaper for electricity as well as gas. If you use that as your benchmark, payback will take a lot longer. Of course tracker could go up in a big way though, so it’s not guaranteed.
I guess they're either trying to keep the price down (for people who don't know what size to ask for) or picking a size that would make sense on an old fashioned tariff, when you just want to store excess solar in the summer to get you through the night.
As the systems are modular 5kwh makes sense, as starting 10kwh means its VERY VERY heavy to lift but also few people will want 20kwh... some people might want 10, some may want 15. You may then ask why not just make the base units 10kwh and have 5kwh as option and that again goes down to weight but also economy of scale makes more sense making 1000 units of 5kwh unit than 500 of each just from a storing point of view.
We are in the first few months of running solar alongside our V2H charger and have already benefitted hugely from the dfs events and forced export function. Importing at 7.5p to charge both cars overnight and then exporting at 15p with remaining car battery is saving us lots of pennies. Looking forward to see how spring and summer pan out as the sunny days return and the export increases.
Good video. Match the battery to the average generation of your solar. That is the most economical combination. Also remember there is a 10 to 15% round trip loss on charge discharge cycles.
I am very much a believer in Solar PV and I can see how batteries can help but surely this is subject to the supplier tariff which can change over time.This links to the optimum size of the battery required - a bigger battery has allowed you to take a margin out of the cheap overnight electricity supply vs. the significantly higher amount that the supplier pays you to give back energy at peak demand times during the day. If it were not for this tariff situation you would most likely find that 5kWh would have been enough to allow your daytime solar PV generation to be used to meet your house needs overnight until the sun rises again the next day.
There will always be price fluctuations for electricity thats just how the network works, Check out octopus agile thats real time price changes in energy wholesale. Energy trading from home is the future of home energy
Colchester, essex GSSolar installed for me on a east west roof 19 x 415w panel's and tigo optimisers with 9.5kw givenergy gen3 battery any gen3 inverter for £11900, installed in oct 2023
Mate. Great video. This is exactly the system i am looking to install. If you fancy it, i wouldnt mind a video on the apps you use for all this. I have a myenergi zappi to charge the car and the app looks like it does solar too. But then is there an app for the Alpha battery and the enphase micro inverters? What made you go for the alpha over the tesla or givenergy? Im guessing price was a factor
At the time it was only battery offered by Heatable, I now have a discount on Heatable installs at evnick.com/solar if that helps see my video on home assistant it’s a way to use one app for everything
Not only batteries but the inverter need to be sized correctly for daily usage, from my research into getting a solar and battery system. Do you not find you have to continually fixate on when you can turn appliances on, with a small AC coupled inverter in these winter months? I think It would drive me crazy always worrying about what I could use.
As my system is solar plus battery inverter If my soalr is making energy its 3.6 PLUS solar so that can add another 3kw almost if prefect sun however I've not noticed MUCH clipping only when showering. Heatable now fit big inverters depending on the DNO requirements after some discussion from my install.
yeah concur with this.. but dont discount the givenergy 9.5kWh, relatively cheap if you look for offers. I got one fitted in dec last year with a 3kW ac coupled inverter. It also has a 3kW off grid supply which could be useful. Thanks Nick, all good stuff..
9.5kwh battery is fine its near enough 10, however I think what I and heatable quickly learnt 3kw ac can for some homes and loads just be a bit under power
@@NicolasRaimo yeah I suppose it depends on one's particular circumstances but I find 3kW OK, most of the load is on the 6 hrs cheap tariff and during the day it's augmented by solar. We have an ashp and 2x evs.
Again we are looking at WINTER data, also the battery-only install would be more than the difference from solar-only to batteries. As engineers are already on site for solar the difference for adding batteries is a little bit of labour plus the kit itself. When summer comes I think the solar panels will blow the battery-only system out of the water also with a battery-only system you betting that there will always be a good price difference between peak and off-peak and that gap has got smaller year on year.
9:30 if they "cannot afford" £1k extra for OVER-DOUBLE the size, they should not be shopping for a system. clearly, pricing model is set to milk those going for the cheapest (and maybe top-range too) because just on material it should cost more...
Just curious, have you had any days without any solar generation? December 4th and December 6th were especially poor days for solar so with your panels being marketed as 'good for low light' I'm wondering how they coped with those dark winter days
If you go to evnick.com/solar you can see my data for them days on Enphase system but no I’ve generated every signal day but worse December day was 0.1kwh
Thanks! Relly informative. What I'm curious about is what will be the degradation of yout battery with such use, especially with charging it up all way to 100%. Will it survive even 5 years? As you are getting pretty much 354 charging cycles per year, which is A LOT!
a cycle is 0% to 100% so if battery only goes to 20% its not a full cycle but I get your tried to deduct for that with 354. Talking to friends who are experts in the battery field they told me its fine LFP is really robust chemistry plus if it fails within 5 years its under warranty which is much better outcome than me not using it as much and it failing just out of warranty. Doing What am doing increases the PAY back of the system, if your buying a solar system the shorter the payback the better if you make your battery last 5 years longer but it takes 5 years longer for payback you've not benefited from it.
@@NicolasRaimoperfectly understand about payback, and if battery pays for itself in under 5 years - makes sense. If payback takes it over the warranty period - then business case falls apart. Really curios to see how it performs after long term use in this mode, after couple of years!
@@NicolasRaimofound that LFP support 3000 cycles under hard conditions (yours case), or up to 10000 cycles in light usage. Interesting. Thanks for pointing that out. (just hope people don't ignore charging cycles and at least take it into concideration)
I've just had Solar and Battery Storage installed and it is being commissioned today. I have had a look at this video twice now and downloaded a copy of the Spreadsheet which I have to say gone above me. Not sure what the 11p Average is. IF you are on Octopus Outgoing (the 15p/kwh Export Tariff with Octopus), what is your import tariff out of curiosity? I am not sure whether I would go with this or Flux as hearing mixed things.
My import is octopus intelligent my peak cost is 30p and offpeak is 7.5p so as some of the use was ev charging my average cost per kwh was massively reduced on my bill pre solar... After solar and battery the average came down even more due to using even less peak 30p meaning am now at 11p
@@NicolasRaimo that is one I’ve been considering, and had downloaded your spreadsheet removing the 15p and 11p mentions on it. Some have said on forums that it’s not a “be all and end all” tariff for everyone. I just switched from Loyal Octopus to agile as my new system is to be commissioned hopefully from today
Hi, Having Heatable install 18 REA Fusion 2 panels & a 10Kw battery starting tomorrow, can you give any advice I'm also a Octopus customer on the flexable tariff. Many thanks John (Nottingham)
Hey John, every person who's used my referral link by heatable have told me how AMAZING they have been so am confident you won't have any issues, which battery did you go for? Do you have an electric car currently?
@@NicolasRaimo I honestly believe you are, thank you for that, but factor in dual rate tariff, EV charging complications with home batteries and swapping stuff to run on cheap overnight electricity and it’s already complex enough without batteries and solar. I know my total energy bill per month is less than I used to spend on petrol and diesel so I’m happy with that for now. It’s impossible to get anyone to do the install without at least 50% payment up front too and most want 100% before doing anything and that’s just too risky for me.
@@st200ol Heatable huge national firm with 5 star trust pilot score you could pay with a credit card to protect you or you could even take monthly finance from them this gives extra levels of protection
@@NicolasRaimo Will give it a go, the proplem I've got is the house battery runs the house and i only ever take power from grid when it's 7p(IOG) but i don't want to include EV Charging in my spreadsheet but all data is tired in to one. Feel like it's going to take me years to see my ROI, ony way is if i also see what it would have been at 30p per kwh
Hi, I went for the Alpha G3 10.1kw battery, we don't yet own an EV but that maybe something later down the line as the panels and the battery are a big investment. I'm just a little stumped by the tariffs open with Octopus as when I have looked on my account it only show two options open to me do I need to look as a new customer to get the Flux option with other tariffs? thanks for your help John
Hi John evnick.com/energy has links to join these other deals you will need a working smart meter to be on them and Octopus flux means your need an EXPORT mpan first this can take 4-6 weeks after your solar is finished and needs to be request by you once your final paperwork is back from heatable
@@NicolasRaimo Hi Nicolas, this Heatable install not going very smooth, they came last Thursday just placed battery outside, Friday only spent 90mins onsite were now at Tuesday and still not complete as they have been given the wrong parts and my not return till this Coming Friday. My good lady not very happy!!
@@johnevans7522 hey John your first person to report an issue to me and I know of loads of installed carried about with zero hiccups, sadly issues can occur with any company with best intentions maybe drop them an email and give them a chance to make it right for you sorry to hear it’s not gone smoothly
I just don’t get it. Solar is a pretty bad investment choice, why bang on all the time about ROI? If you want an investment, stick the money you paid out into a stocks and shares isa, S&P500 etf, around 8% return a year right from day dot I’m not against solar, but the reality is, it’s not a brilliant investment choice. Do it for other reasons
Solar ROI is far more than just your money coming back monthly it’s also the increased value and sell ability of your home estate agents adds between 4-14% take that into the equation and your quids in
@@NicolasRaimo only if you sell your house 👏. It’s objectively not a good investment. Good meaning profitable compared to other investments. There are reasons to do it, making money isn’t one
Agreed. Solar is still bollocks. If you want to feel like you're saving the planet and you really like the Idea of making your own energy get it. It's not a smart financial decision.
Heatable are a premium install with a premium product, they are comparable to other premium fitters, quite happy with the product and the work I’ve seen what happens when you pay cheap you pay twice
Follow spreadsheet at evnick.com/solar Get a price for solar or battery installs from evnick.com/heatable
That is a respectable set of generation figures, given your latitude and roof orientation.
Have you noticed that people never query spending the same amount of cash on a holiday that you (wisely) chose to invest in a solar PV system, instead?
Agreed the figures are massive for number of panels … agreed it’s a family size holiday to benefit you for life
They added the force discharge feature to my FoxESS system back in September last year and it was a game changer I took part in 6 saving sessions and managed to get net zero cost (excluding standing charge) for November and December so I had to rethink my ROI calculation
Really interesting information and good advice.
After 3 months of operating my system and I'm now in the process of replacing my 2 electric showers by installing an electric hot water tank. Now instead of the system clipping my solar output when my batteries are full, it will switch to heating my hot water. It won't necessarily reduce my overall electrical consumption, but it will definitely reduce the stress and strain on the batteries and the inverter, when the showers are running. Especially on that initial spike which is always best to avoid whenever possible to extend the life of those expensive batteries.
I’m surprised companies do undersell battery capacity. I pushed for 10 and I’m glad I did. 5kwh is totally underpowered and will leave you short, especially in the winter. With DFS and forced export at decent rates, getting at least 10 is a no brainer. The only thing making me question it now, is Octopus Tracker is much cheaper for electricity as well as gas. If you use that as your benchmark, payback will take a lot longer. Of course tracker could go up in a big way though, so it’s not guaranteed.
I guess they're either trying to keep the price down (for people who don't know what size to ask for) or picking a size that would make sense on an old fashioned tariff, when you just want to store excess solar in the summer to get you through the night.
As the systems are modular 5kwh makes sense, as starting 10kwh means its VERY VERY heavy to lift but also few people will want 20kwh... some people might want 10, some may want 15. You may then ask why not just make the base units 10kwh and have 5kwh as option and that again goes down to weight but also economy of scale makes more sense making 1000 units of 5kwh unit than 500 of each just from a storing point of view.
We are in the first few months of running solar alongside our V2H charger and have already benefitted hugely from the dfs events and forced export function. Importing at 7.5p to charge both cars overnight and then exporting at 15p with remaining car battery is saving us lots of pennies. Looking forward to see how spring and summer pan out as the sunny days return and the export increases.
Good video. Match the battery to the average generation of your solar. That is the most economical combination. Also remember there is a 10 to 15% round trip loss on charge discharge cycles.
I am very much a believer in Solar PV and I can see how batteries can help but surely this is subject to the supplier tariff which can change over time.This links to the optimum size of the battery required - a bigger battery has allowed you to take a margin out of the cheap overnight electricity supply vs. the significantly higher amount that the supplier pays you to give back energy at peak demand times during the day. If it were not for this tariff situation you would most likely find that 5kWh would have been enough to allow your daytime solar PV generation to be used to meet your house needs overnight until the sun rises again the next day.
There will always be price fluctuations for electricity thats just how the network works, Check out octopus agile thats real time price changes in energy wholesale. Energy trading from home is the future of home energy
Colchester, essex GSSolar installed for me on a east west roof 19 x 415w panel's and tigo optimisers with 9.5kw givenergy gen3 battery any gen3 inverter for £11900, installed in oct 2023
10 phase? Now that must be good 👍
Enphase
Mate. Great video. This is exactly the system i am looking to install. If you fancy it, i wouldnt mind a video on the apps you use for all this. I have a myenergi zappi to charge the car and the app looks like it does solar too. But then is there an app for the Alpha battery and the enphase micro inverters? What made you go for the alpha over the tesla or givenergy? Im guessing price was a factor
At the time it was only battery offered by Heatable, I now have a discount on Heatable installs at evnick.com/solar if that helps see my video on home assistant it’s a way to use one app for everything
Not only batteries but the inverter need to be sized correctly for daily usage, from my research into getting a solar and battery system. Do you not find you have to continually fixate on when you can turn appliances on, with a small AC coupled inverter in these winter months? I think It would drive me crazy always worrying about what I could use.
Yup, 3.6KW is usually not enough for most houses.
I’d say an average house needs at least an inverter (to run from batteries) of 5KW
As my system is solar plus battery inverter If my soalr is making energy its 3.6 PLUS solar so that can add another 3kw almost if prefect sun however I've not noticed MUCH clipping only when showering. Heatable now fit big inverters depending on the DNO requirements after some discussion from my install.
yeah concur with this.. but dont discount the givenergy 9.5kWh, relatively cheap if you look for offers. I got one fitted in dec last year with a 3kW ac coupled inverter. It also has a 3kW off grid supply which could be useful. Thanks Nick, all good stuff..
9.5kwh battery is fine its near enough 10, however I think what I and heatable quickly learnt 3kw ac can for some homes and loads just be a bit under power
@@NicolasRaimo yeah I suppose it depends on one's particular circumstances but I find 3kW OK, most of the load is on the 6 hrs cheap tariff and during the day it's augmented by solar. We have an ashp and 2x evs.
Looks like you would have had a much better ROI without solar panels and slightly increased battery capacity
Again we are looking at WINTER data, also the battery-only install would be more than the difference from solar-only to batteries. As engineers are already on site for solar the difference for adding batteries is a little bit of labour plus the kit itself. When summer comes I think the solar panels will blow the battery-only system out of the water also with a battery-only system you betting that there will always be a good price difference between peak and off-peak and that gap has got smaller year on year.
9:30 if they "cannot afford" £1k extra for OVER-DOUBLE the size, they should not be shopping for a system.
clearly, pricing model is set to milk those going for the cheapest (and maybe top-range too) because just on material it should cost more...
Just curious, have you had any days without any solar generation? December 4th and December 6th were especially poor days for solar so with your panels being marketed as 'good for low light' I'm wondering how they coped with those dark winter days
If you go to evnick.com/solar you can see my data for them days on Enphase system but no I’ve generated every signal day but worse December day was 0.1kwh
Thanks! Relly informative.
What I'm curious about is what will be the degradation of yout battery with such use, especially with charging it up all way to 100%. Will it survive even 5 years? As you are getting pretty much 354 charging cycles per year, which is A LOT!
a cycle is 0% to 100% so if battery only goes to 20% its not a full cycle but I get your tried to deduct for that with 354. Talking to friends who are experts in the battery field they told me its fine LFP is really robust chemistry plus if it fails within 5 years its under warranty which is much better outcome than me not using it as much and it failing just out of warranty. Doing What am doing increases the PAY back of the system, if your buying a solar system the shorter the payback the better if you make your battery last 5 years longer but it takes 5 years longer for payback you've not benefited from it.
@@NicolasRaimoperfectly understand about payback, and if battery pays for itself in under 5 years - makes sense. If payback takes it over the warranty period - then business case falls apart.
Really curios to see how it performs after long term use in this mode, after couple of years!
@@NicolasRaimofound that LFP support 3000 cycles under hard conditions (yours case), or up to 10000 cycles in light usage. Interesting.
Thanks for pointing that out. (just hope people don't ignore charging cycles and at least take it into concideration)
@@dimav83 every warranty period is different and lab test show far more cycles than that
I've just had Solar and Battery Storage installed and it is being commissioned today. I have had a look at this video twice now and downloaded a copy of the Spreadsheet which I have to say gone above me. Not sure what the 11p Average is. IF you are on Octopus Outgoing (the 15p/kwh Export Tariff with Octopus), what is your import tariff out of curiosity? I am not sure whether I would go with this or Flux as hearing mixed things.
My import is octopus intelligent my peak cost is 30p and offpeak is 7.5p so as some of the use was ev charging my average cost per kwh was massively reduced on my bill pre solar... After solar and battery the average came down even more due to using even less peak 30p meaning am now at 11p
@@NicolasRaimo thanks. I’m guessing that’s more for ev than just solar and battery
@@james36515 evnick.com/energy shows flux which may be best for you
@@NicolasRaimo that is one I’ve been considering, and had downloaded your spreadsheet removing the 15p and 11p mentions on it. Some have said on forums that it’s not a “be all and end all” tariff for everyone. I just switched from Loyal Octopus to agile as my new system is to be commissioned hopefully from today
Hi, Having Heatable install 18 REA Fusion 2 panels & a 10Kw battery starting tomorrow, can you give any advice I'm also a Octopus customer on the flexable tariff. Many thanks John (Nottingham)
Hey John, every person who's used my referral link by heatable have told me how AMAZING they have been so am confident you won't have any issues, which battery did you go for? Do you have an electric car currently?
EDF just offered me SEG of 40P/kWh.. This is more than my peak 27p unit rate.. seems a bit crazy??
Where you seeing that? According to there website it’s 5.6p
I did look at solar and a battery but I don’t have a degree in mathematics and economics so life is just too short. 🤷♂️
All companies give you a projected payback on the quote am just telling you how to beat it
@@NicolasRaimo I honestly believe you are, thank you for that, but factor in dual rate tariff, EV charging complications with home batteries and swapping stuff to run on cheap overnight electricity and it’s already complex enough without batteries and solar. I know my total energy bill per month is less than I used to spend on petrol and diesel so I’m happy with that for now. It’s impossible to get anyone to do the install without at least 50% payment up front too and most want 100% before doing anything and that’s just too risky for me.
@@st200ol Heatable huge national firm with 5 star trust pilot score you could pay with a credit card to protect you or you could even take monthly finance from them this gives extra levels of protection
Please can you share your spreadsheet am struggling to figure mine out with house load, ev load separated etc 12kwh battery
To seperate the data 📈 I have home assistant extracting and capturing all the data you can download the spreadsheet from evnick.com/solar
@@NicolasRaimo Will give it a go, the proplem I've got is the house battery runs the house and i only ever take power from grid when it's 7p(IOG) but i don't want to include EV Charging in my spreadsheet but all data is tired in to one. Feel like it's going to take me years to see my ROI, ony way is if i also see what it would have been at 30p per kwh
Hi, I went for the Alpha G3 10.1kw battery, we don't yet own an EV but that maybe something later down the line as the panels and the battery are a big investment. I'm just a little stumped by the tariffs open with Octopus as when I have looked on my account it only show two options open to me do I need to look as a new customer to get the Flux option with other tariffs? thanks for your help John
Hi John evnick.com/energy has links to join these other deals you will need a working smart meter to be on them and Octopus flux means your need an EXPORT mpan first this can take 4-6 weeks after your solar is finished and needs to be request by you once your final paperwork is back from heatable
@@NicolasRaimo Hi Nicolas, this Heatable install not going very smooth, they came last Thursday just placed battery outside, Friday only spent 90mins onsite were now at Tuesday and still not complete as they have been given the wrong parts and my not return till this Coming Friday. My good lady not very happy!!
@@johnevans7522 hey John your first person to report an issue to me and I know of loads of installed carried about with zero hiccups, sadly issues can occur with any company with best intentions maybe drop them an email and give them a chance to make it right for you sorry to hear it’s not gone smoothly
wow! your eyes! striking! :)
😊 thank you
I just don’t get it.
Solar is a pretty bad investment choice, why bang on all the time about ROI?
If you want an investment, stick the money you paid out into a stocks and shares isa, S&P500 etf, around 8% return a year right from day dot
I’m not against solar, but the reality is, it’s not a brilliant investment choice.
Do it for other reasons
Solar ROI is far more than just your money coming back monthly it’s also the increased value and sell ability of your home estate agents adds between 4-14% take that into the equation and your quids in
@@NicolasRaimo only if you sell your house 👏. It’s objectively not a good investment. Good meaning profitable compared to other investments. There are reasons to do it, making money isn’t one
@@familyoffourdisneydreaming6081 your home is the best long term investment you make…
@@NicolasRaimo only if you sell it. A house is a decent investment, your home isn’t, because you need somewhere to live.
Also, not very diversified.
Agreed. Solar is still bollocks. If you want to feel like you're saving the planet and you really like the Idea of making your own energy get it. It's not a smart financial decision.
I get quote from someone 12x 410w PV solar plus givenergy 9.5kw battery plus inverter for 8100£. You get ripped
This sounds really,really cheap. I'd be curious to know what gear you get at that price!
Heatable are a premium install with a premium product, they are comparable to other premium fitters, quite happy with the product and the work I’ve seen what happens when you pay cheap you pay twice
Good luck with your expectations of them still being around to honor any warranty issues.
@@fredgaine1330 9.5kwh givenergy battery plus givenergy 3rd gen inverter plus 12x longi 410w panels
Mine was cheaper than yours I got Eddie car charger and zappi installed also . But I don't want go round tell people they got ripped !
NOT the most efficient panels
please explain
@@HOSPlTALLER do your own research
@@thomasneely2700 dont know what point your trying to make.
@@HOSPlTALLER you messaged me fool.
@@thomasneely2700 yeah still dont know what you jibber jabber about.