New builds and solar panels

[phope]

It's been a hectic week, so haven't had much time to read up on this topic, so perhaps those with more knowledge and experience than me on solar panels can chip in.

Location: North East Scotland. We're going to view a new-build development tomorrow with a view to maybe putting down a deposit on an unconstructed plot - plan being that we could tailor the final spec to our own choices, room layouts, etc and have completion in late 2020 which suits us just fine. (also a big plus that the homes all have full fibre broadband direct to the home...150-300 megabits )

A quick look around the development shows that the properties built to date all have 3-6 solar panels integrated as standard into the roofs depending on size of home and depending on spec/size, some have gas combi boilers and some with condensing boilers. None have under-floor heating and isn't an option at all from the developers (mid size Scottish firm)

The aesthetics of panels don't bother me at all and I understand a little of the energy efficiency requirements of the 2015 Scottish building regulations for emissions, balancing the mix of insulation and renewable energy sources like solar, heat pumps, etc

Would I be right in thinking that:

As a typical modern panel has a peak generation of around 300 watts, a 3-6 panel system would generate max of 1kW to 2kW peak per day - this could be say max 10-20% reduction in metered usage compared to a home without panels?

Without any battery storage solution evident in the house specs so far or feeding back into grid, the electric generated is simply used to relieve grid usage during the daytime and to pre-heat water, cutting down on boiler usage?

Battery storage systems like Tesla Powerwall and the like seem really expensive for the amount of charge they can store (around £6500 for a single 13 kWh pack) and really aren't suited to small scale panel installations like these 3-6 panels, or am I wrong?

Edited by phope on Saturday 18th January 23:07

[phope]

No - all the properties have them, including neighbouring social housing

[phope]

bsc8180 said:

I wonder if the panels are for solar thermal as opposed to solar pv?

Some of the properties are definitely gas combi boilers but still have panels, so I can only guess at this stage that the panels (limited as they are in number) must still generate some electric for daytime usage

Edited by phope on Sunday 19th January 09:42

[phope]

Aluminati said:

It's a developer ticking a box. The actual benefit of 3-6 panels is zero.

I agree to an extent - they’ll be doing the bare minimum needed to keep the house style within a efficiency calculation/threshold for building regs.

[phope]

Jambo85 said:

I also wouldn’t buy a house on the strength of fibre internet - it’ll be everywhere soon enough!

Sorry for being so negative but hope it’s somewhat helpful!

Small village like this will always be near the tailend of any big future rollout of universal fibre so to have it 10 years or so ahead of others would be attractive. I hadn’t even realised the newest properties were getting it, as the very earliest ones in the development are still listed on Openreach as copper.

Floor plans for available house styles that I quickly snapped whilst having a initial conversation with salesman the previous week do clearly show optical termination units though and he did state that full fibre was now specced for the latest builds

No harm in healthy scepticism/ negativity!

[phope]

Don’t know why. We had it in our last house - it was great

Salesman simply said it wasn’t even an option on any house style, even the largest 5 bed homes they are offering.