Solar Panels?

[pingu393]

Archie2050 said:

Our solar just peaked at 5.72 kW in February, that’s mental!

Very impressed.

That's a nice dashboard. It shows exactly the information that I want to know.

What app is it? What hardware do you need to connect it to?

[anonymous-user]

Road2Ruin said:

Archie2050 said:

Our solar just peaked at 5.72 kW in February, that’s mental!

Very impressed.

That is pretty impressive. Hiw big is the array and what way does it face?

It’s 8kWp and our roof is south facing and shallow (30 degree pitch) so the efficient is very high (94% by the calculator)

We will definitely be selling back in the summer

It’s the GivEnergi App that you get with the Inverter, it’s great lots of granular data and you can monitor it remotely as well. When we are away I’m going to dump the batteries back to the grid at 2am and get paid 49p

Edited by anonymous-user on Saturday 25th February 12:27

[M1AGM]

Peaked at 6.8kw on Thursday up here in North Yorkshire off a 8.7kw PV array.

Fwiw it produced a total of 8.87mwh in 2022.

[anonymous-user]

M1AGM said:

Peaked at 6.8kw on Thursday up here in North Yorkshire off a 8.7kw PV array.

Fwiw it produced a total of 8.87mwh in 2022.

Wow, that’s good to know, thanks. Our installers reckoned we would make around 7mWh so that sounds realistic from your experience.
Provided we can use it or sell back at the rate they modelled (25p. The same as Octopus) the payback is less than 7 years

[deanobeano]

5.2 kW peak today for me (6.5kWP) array.

Due to cloud edge effect, you often get short, high generation spikes when its cloudy.

As a comparison, on Sunday 13th Feb, my generation curve was almost a perfect bell curve. 21 kWhr generated, but peak generation was only 4.2kW.

[M1AGM]

Archie2050 said:

M1AGM said:

Peaked at 6.8kw on Thursday up here in North Yorkshire off a 8.7kw PV array.

Fwiw it produced a total of 8.87mwh in 2022.

Wow, that’s good to know, thanks. Our installers reckoned we would make around 7mWh so that sounds realistic from your experience.
Provided we can use it or sell back at the rate they modelled (25p. The same as Octopus) the payback is less than 7 years

You’re very welcome.

Whats the 25p bit about? I get 4.5p export on octopus.


Eta just noticed I had 7.1kwh peak output on the 20th.

Edited by M1AGM on Saturday 25th February 16:37

[Blib]

We had an Enphase system fitted exactly a year ago. We're still awaiting delivery of their batteries.

There's no supply in the UK and Enphase UK have no idea when any stock will be available.

What's more frustrating is that stock is reaching Europe. Apoarently, the UK government is slow at certification.

[Jurgen100]

Archie2050 said:

Jurgen100 said:

Our installation has just gone live this afternoon. 17 panels on a virtually south facing roof in Hampshire. 10kwh battery and an Eddi as well. I’ll share some real world stats once I have any.

Snap!

We went live with 20 panels (7.9kWp) 2x5.2kWh batteries and and Eddi and a Zappi on Sunday.

Watching the electrons flow on the app has (temporarily) replaced Netflix as family entertainment.

Which inverter and panels did you go for? We have a GivEnergi (ugh!) 5000w hybrid and Vertex s 395w panels.

It’s great stuff even in cloudy February and I’m trying to work out all the various software schedules to sync everything, nearly done I think.

We went for the following:
17 x Jinko 415W mono-crystalline solar panels
Renusol Variosole On-roof mounting system
1 x Solis 6kW solar inverter
1 x GIV-BAT GivEnergy battery 9.5 kWh
1 x MyEnergi Eddi

Think I’ve figured out all the settings now tying it in to work with our Zappi so can just sit back and let it do its thing.

[Monsterlime]

We are looking into Solar at the moment, especially with the stuff up here in Scotland.

One thing I need to clarify though, because I am bit confused. We have had two quotes, both for a 6kwp installation, but one has included a 5kw inverter and the other has only included a 3.6kw inverter. I queried this with the 2nd installer, and they indicated a 3.6kw inverter would be fine, but my Googling and very limited knowledge says this is not right.

Is a 3.6kw inverter suitable?

[Enut]

M1AGM said:

Peaked at 6.8kw on Thursday up here in North Yorkshire off a 8.7kw PV array.

Fwiw it produced a total of 8.87mwh in 2022.

I have a 6.2 KW system, apparently it peaked at 6.838 KW at 1.55 pm today, interesting how, according to the SOLIS app, it generated more power than it's capable of!

[Jambo85]

Monsterlime said:

We are looking into Solar at the moment, especially with the stuff up here in Scotland.

One thing I need to clarify though, because I am bit confused. We have had two quotes, both for a 6kwp installation, but one has included a 5kw inverter and the other has only included a 3.6kw inverter. I queried this with the 2nd installer, and they indicated a 3.6kw inverter would be fine, but my Googling and very limited knowledge says this is not right.

Is a 3.6kw inverter suitable?

Undersizing inverters versus the peak panel output is common but I don’t know exact details on how this is done and would tend to agree that 3.6 kW is, on the face of it, quite an undersizing vs 6 kWp. Do all your proposed panels point south?

[Monsterlime]

Jambo85 said:

Undersizing inverters versus the peak panel output is common but I don’t know exact details on how this is done and would tend to agree that 3.6 kW is, on the face of it, quite an undersizing vs 6 kWp. Do all your proposed panels point south?

More like South West, but all the panels will definitely get sun the summer.

[gazapc]

Monsterlime said:

Jambo85 said:

Undersizing inverters versus the peak panel output is common but I don’t know exact details on how this is done and would tend to agree that 3.6 kW is, on the face of it, quite an undersizing vs 6 kWp. Do all your proposed panels point south?

More like South West, but all the panels will definitely get sun the summer.

Another thing to consider is if you are having a battery is to check max charge/discharge rates of the smaller inverter.


The installer is probably just trying to go with 3.68 kW because that would mean just notifying the DNO (under G98). For a 5 kW inverter you need to apply for permission to connect before install. Although this has got easier recently as a new fast track process has been introduced.

[Condi]

Monsterlime said:

We are looking into Solar at the moment, especially with the stuff up here in Scotland.

One thing I need to clarify though, because I am bit confused. We have had two quotes, both for a 6kwp installation, but one has included a 5kw inverter and the other has only included a 3.6kw inverter. I queried this with the 2nd installer, and they indicated a 3.6kw inverter would be fine, but my Googling and very limited knowledge says this is not right.

Is a 3.6kw inverter suitable?

It's suitable, yes. 3.6Kw is the most you can send back to the grid cheaply and easily (ie on a domestic single phase connection), so most installers will fit that size, as it means 100% of the power from the inverter can be exported if not being used at home - there is no harm in having a smaller inverter than the size of your array, on sunny days, your panels will produce more than the inverter can handle and be shut down, but this is England and your 6Kw system won't hit near it's rated output for 95% of the year.

If you can use 5Kw at home, for example you have an EV or battery bank and it is plugged in during the day then you'll see a benefit from the larger inverter on sunny days, but for the remaining 80% of the time you won't notice the difference.

Edited by Condi on Monday 27th February 00:20

[Jambo85]

Condi said:

Monsterlime said:

We are looking into Solar at the moment, especially with the stuff up here in Scotland.

One thing I need to clarify though, because I am bit confused. We have had two quotes, both for a 6kwp installation, but one has included a 5kw inverter and the other has only included a 3.6kw inverter. I queried this with the 2nd installer, and they indicated a 3.6kw inverter would be fine, but my Googling and very limited knowledge says this is not right.

Is a 3.6kw inverter suitable?

It's suitable, yes. 3.6Kw is the most you can send back to the grid cheaply and easily (ie on a domestic single phase connection), so most installers will fit that size, as it means 100% of the power from the inverter can be exported if not being used at home - there is no harm in having a smaller inverter than the size of your array, on sunny days, your panels will produce more than the inverter can handle and be shut down, but this is England and your 6Kw system won't hit near it's rated output for 95% of the year.

If you can use 5Kw at home, for example you have an EV or battery bank and it is plugged in during the day then you'll see a benefit from the larger inverter on sunny days, but for the remaining 80% of the time you won't notice the difference.

Edited by Condi on Monday 27th February 00:20

It absolutely isn't England, pal.

That and export limitations aside I'd be interested to see the working on that, while I follow your logic, a south facing array can bang out close to its name plate capacity quite a lot of the time, derating from 6 kW to 3.6 kW seems excessive to me and just a waste of panels and roof space. But I'll admit that's gut feel.

Bear in mind too that I think panels are rated on their DC output, whereas inverters are rated on their AC output, and there is an efficiency loss, so that alone can count for some of the under sizing. I also asked about orientation as my east/west array has an undersized inverter for that reason.

[OutInTheShed]

But the number of hours per year when you'd get significant value from inverting more than 3.6kW may be quite small.

More so if you can run panel to battery conversion in parallel with the inverter rather than through it.

[Evanivitch]

Condi said:

It's suitable, yes. 3.6Kw is the most you can send back to the grid cheaply and easily (ie on a domestic single phase connection),

It's not that bit a deal to submit a G99 application. Most DNO are used to it now and turn them around quickly. At worse they limit to 3.6kW export but you can still have an inverter with an export cap, this allowing your inverter and/or batteries to better power heating and EV charging facilities.

[anonymous-user]

Evanivitch said:

Condi said:

It's suitable, yes. 3.6Kw is the most you can send back to the grid cheaply and easily (ie on a domestic single phase connection),

It's not that bit a deal to submit a G99 application. Most DNO are used to it now and turn them around quickly. At worse they limit to 3.6kW export but you can still have an inverter with an export cap, this allowing your inverter and/or batteries to better power heating and EV charging facilities.

Yes, mine put in the application but said not to worry, they could limit the inverter in software if the approval did not arrive in time so it wouldn't delay installation. In fact it came in a couple of weeks.

Seeing how much energy is being produced I'm glad we went for the bigger one, the cost is hardly any more.

[Monsterlime]

This is useful, thank you. We are going to be installing a battery as well, between 5 - 7.5 kw depending on installer.

[Condi]

Jambo85 said:

, a south facing array can bang out close to its name plate capacity quite a lot of the time, derating from 6 kW to 3.6 kW seems excessive to me and just a waste of panels and roof space.

Can it?

I mean, it won't, especially not in Scotland, but you're right 6kw down to 3.6kw is a lot if the whole array is facing the same direction. Ultimately it comes down to the cost difference between the 2, and whether you can use/save anything above 3.6Kw. If the cost difference isn't great, or you have a home battery/EV, then there is no reason not to have the bigger inverter,