Solar panels ....... what are you experiences? What are the good ones?

[FenceFurniture]

Interested to hear from people who have reasonably recently installed solar panels.

Costs?
Savings?
Money back from the power company?

In particular what are the good brands/installers, and what are the pitfalls to watch out for?

I'm thinking that with the large shed extension I'll be doing I could put a skilliion roof on both parts of the shed which would naturally face north.

[fxst]

I have 2kv of solar panels on the roof. I think most panels are good regardless of brand, its the inverter that needs to be a good brand I have a sunnyboy and no complaints. I paid about 2k for them but not sure now. As to money back from the power co.... Meh..... I just want to reduce my costs and it works for me. I think if people just tried to reduce costs instead of trying to profit from them more would be able to afford their power as the costs may go down but my opinion only
Pete

[ajw]

Watching this thread with interest. I'd like to do the same..

ajw

[Sir Stinkalot]

Costs? = Getting cheaper to install as the various tariffs drop off. The price of the systems when the feed in tariffs were high (price the power company pays you for excess power fed into grid) were also high. As the feed in tariffs have reduced in their various steps the cost of the solar install also magically started to drop. I wonder where the extra money went.

Savings? = With the low feed in tariffs on offer now you don't really make much money selling back to the grid. Leaving battery storage aside for the moment the current recommendations seem to size your system to match your consumption whist the sun is shining. The best savings are made by moving your tasks (dishwasher, washing machine etc) to when you are generating your own power and avoid selling excess cheaply to the grid only to buy it back again at retail price when the sun is down. This may vary a little depending on your area and any off peak tariffs and the like.

Money back from the power company? = Getting less all the time. The minimum amount that the power companies need to offer to purchase your excess power is often up for review. Despite the comments that competition will keep the buy back high I have only seen it drop. Coupled with the drop they are paying for your power they seem to increase the daily supply charge so you need to pay more even if your using less power.

In particular what are the good brands/installers, and what are the pitfalls to watch out for? = You will get plenty of opinion on this and it would generally be grouped by what each person has. I have and SMA inverter and Canadian Solar panels (please note Canadian panels are made in China not Canada despite the name!). Personally I would go for a top of the range inverter (like SMA) and go middle of the range panels.

North facing is obviously good. Have a look at http://pvoutput.org/ and see if you can find some systems in your area. Typically they list the size, orientation and equipment so you can get an idea of what output you may expect.

With such a high uptake of residential solar, and power companies constantly looking at how they are going to claw back their profits, battery technology will be the next breakthrough. The prices will drop and the range will increase. This will then start to change the dynamics a little as the idea would be to generate enough power during the day to cover your night time use. This is likely to be at odds to the sizing your system just to cover your daytime use, but there is nothing stopping you adding a second system if need when adding batteries in the future. Whilst it would be good to wait until batteries are cheaper and do it all in one go there are still benefits jumping on now.

[Bob38S]

Have had panels on the roof for 5+ years now, got the good input return which has now been reduced to almost negligible.

System is 3.4kw as that was the largest the power company would allow us at the time, I wanted a 5kw. Unfortunately, the largest capacity panel at the time was 170w so we have 20 of them. The returns are certainly diminishing as the tariffs are constantly rising but it certainly has been worth it to us. Initially we had some nil bills but with the diminished difference between input returns and costs per kW and the various service charges we now get bills in the region of $70 to $100.

I believe hat Hitachi now has a 400w panel available but it is approximately the size of a front door, I would be looking in this direction should I be doing it now.

For us it has been worth it and the system has paid for itself. Under today's returns I would still do it again while fully understanding that it would take longer to pay for itself but then again the costs of panels etc have also reduced considerably.

If you are putting it on to make money, forget it, if you are putting it on to help reduce your current bills, then go for it.

[snowyskiesau]

Here's an interesting video analyzing the results of a solar panel installation over 18 months.
There's also a link to the installation.

[FenceFurniture]

Thanks for the replies chaps, very helpful indeed. I will check all those links in the morning.

In the meantime, the Tesla Powerwall has been recently released, which should become extreme news as it's developed and sold:


I also saw a fascinating article in ABC news about Alum ion batteries being developed at Stanford - the implications could be staggering for anything that uses a rechargable battery:
https://www.woodworkforums.com/showthread.php?t=194036

I'm thinking that Elon Musk should be all over this new Al Ion technology for his Powerwalls (and Tesla cars).

It's all a bit exciting, regardless of what the PM thinks.

[Wongo]

Mine is a sad story.

Long story short I had mine installed by a company called jnspjre solar (not actual name). 11 months later my bottom-of-the-range-super-cheap-chinese-made inverter died. No worries I will call the installer. I called and was told that the previous owner went bankrupt and the new owner is not responsible for my inverter. Many phone calls to different people later I ended up buying a SMA Sunnyboy inverter for $2,500. The system has costed me over $10,000 and produced < $1000 in nearly 4 years. F@@@ jnspjire solar and f%%% the government.

If you want to make money then forget it. If you want to save the planet like I did then go for it. Do make sure you get a good installer, do lots of homework and request for a good inverter for example SMA.

[Pearo]

Mine is a sad story.

Long story short I had mine installed by a company called jnspjre solar (not actual name). 11 months later my bottom-of-the-range-super-cheap-chinese-made inverter died. No worries I will call the installer. I called and was told that the previous owner went bankrupt and the new owner is not responsible for my inverter. Many phone calls to different people later I ended up buying a SMA Sunnyboy inverter for $2,500. The system has costed me over $10,000 and produced < $1000 in nearly 4 years. F@@@ jnspjire solar and f%%% the government.

If you want to make money then forget it. If you want to save the planet like I did then go for it. Do make sure you get a good installer, do lots of homework and request for a good inverter for example SMA.

How much has it saved you in electricity costs??

The trick now that the feed in tariffs have been reduced, is to size the system according to your power usage.

[Wongo]

As I stated I saved around $1,000 off my electricity bills in 4 years. We feed the electricity back to the grid at around 26c per kw.

[george mavridis]

As I stated I saved around $1,000 off my electricity bills in 4 years. We feed the electricity back to the grid at around 26c per kw.

So if you saved 1000 in 4 years and it's cost you 10,000 it will take 40 years just to recoup your investment

[Wongo]

Pretty much. I do not for a minute believe that bastard on my roof would last 40 years. If it breaks again then I will write it off.

Like I said I went into this with a "good heart" and money wasn't my no. 1 concern.

[nrb]

We installed 20 panels late 2011 and get 6 cents(retailer) plus 60 cents/kWh (Gov.) until 2024
With credits and not paying or power we have recovered all of our installation costs of around $10700.
Today it seems that systems are about 60% of what we paid but the feed in rate is very low,could still be a saving.

[chrisb691]

I am on the premium feedin tariff, and my 2 kw system has saved me 66% since Nov 2011. However, I have a salt pool which eats power daily. My daughter had the same system installed the same time as me, and is currently about $1,200 in credit. She has never paid a bill since the system was installed. These days though, the feedin tariffs are pathetic, so you can't get the same results.

Where we want to feedin as much as possible of solar generation (because it is worth .66 /kwh), you will want to use as much of the solar generation as you can.

To get tariffs out of the equation, here are the production figures for my system. As I am in Melbourne, you may generate differently. If you are going for a bigger system, you should be able to scale my outputs up, to get approximate figures.

[Poppa]

When I installed my shed I made sure that I had half the roof facing north at a 30 degree elevation (the correct tilt for our area). Haven't installed solar yet, but that is the intention, so I'll be watching this thread with interest. I can recommend the Whirlpool forum for discussion about solar, there are a lot of discussions and information about solar on that site. Some very useful information.

We are also intending installing solar power on the roof of our business, which only uses power during the day. I will be calculating how much Kw we need over the next couple of months, and we are looking at doing the business and our home early in 2016. I would estimate 10Kw for the business (without having done the sums yet) and I want 5-6Kw for our home (we have 3 young kids and then there is my workshop). And I will be following the Tesla power wall and similar solutions carefully over the next few years, as I think a battery solution for after hours use is a very good idea. But I think the cost will be too high initially (for me anyway). I also think we are at the start of what will be a battery revolution over the next 10-20 years. There have been very few major improvements to battery technology in the past 50+ years. Li-Ion was a step forward, but more of a progression than a revolution. With the Al Ion research and the Tesla launch, plus rising power costs, I think this is going to be a big growth area for the foreseeable future.