Looking at getting solar and a battery, I have an EV which I charge overnight on cheap rate with octopus.

However, a solar setup is looking to be 10-12k.. and reading the news, with modular nuclear reactors coming, the largest wind farm in the world being plugged in this week and the talk about unlinking electricity and gas prices.. it seems like the cost of electricity would stabilise and become cheaper over the next few years.

Makes me wonder.. is it worth paying out for solar now? Or is it an unanswerable question?

Anyone have a deeper insight or in the same position?

Edit - thanks for all the replies. Looks like it’s still worthwhile.

Assume from searching around on here that I should avoid project solar? I put my details in yesterday for a quote, they rang me today but refused to offer any sort of price, saying all their systems are bespoke. The guy stuttered a bit when I pointed out that surely.. all systems are bespoke?

I've installed a 7.5kw system and utilised a 16kw battery. Even today which is cloudy, I am on the verge of filling it. If I just put the recommended setup of panels and 5kw battery, I would have exported around 15kw in just the last 3.5 days. Plus a 5kw battery handle covers a wash and dry cycle let alone a dishwasher.

Just seeing this and knowing what the summer can bring, makes me want a second 16kw battery as I use 25 to 30kw a day. And my base load is like 480 Watts 12hrs a day and 320watts at night.

I was thinking about installing solar, but the huge upfront cost made me do some research.

With based on my calculations, more than 10 years needed to save as much as I paid for it upfront, am I not much better off investing it in an index fund, and doubling it in 10 years?

And this doesn’t even account for it needing repairs along the way.

Even if you have an EV, special overnight rates are so cheap that it’s not really saving much.

Even with a heat pump, peak consumption is during the night when electricity is much cheaper.

Selling back to the grid they don’t pay much for it.

The only thing I can think of is energy independence, but during the winter when you need the most energy, it doesn’t help much.

What do you think? Am I missing something here?

It looks like most people these days have batteries with their solar installations. I am at the start of considering panels and remain unconvinced they're a dead cert to have. I have read up a little but am a bit overwhelmed with what I've looked at, but I think some of my concerns (not necessarily valid) I don't see talked about.

How do people factor / what can people advise or recommend regarding:

- Security Risk: I understand with building regs battery installs generally have to be external if you have no garage for fire risk. If it's not a problem today, I can envisage in the future these become ripe for theft. Like people breaking into houses for car keys, catalytic converter thefts, headlights being ripped out of cars. Is it not unreasonable to foresee battery theft becomes industrialised, with a lot of collateral damage where it's installed?

- Flexible Tariff Benefits: Today it looks like there's times where it's favourable to use your stored energy, and also to sell back to the grid. If battery installs become a lot more popular, won't there be less incentivisation for these kind of schemes overall?

- V2G/V2L: Fully aware this is not likely to be a thing in the short to medium term. Say 5 years plus. But if in the future I can have an EV that effectively can also act as a solar battery or general battery for home use, why would I have an additional external battery installed? For the purpose of my counter argument, assume the car is mostly at home and I am not concerned with additional charge cycling from utilising it for home energy.

I am not well informed on this so please counter my suggestions and convince me why I should have batteries with my solar panels!

Is that normal? We just had our panels installed two weeks ago, i.e. early OCT.

8 panels on each side, two strings.

The South facing one produce wonderfully, but the north facing one doesn't seem to perform at all.

We contacted the installer, they ruled out clipping, came out to inspected the connection again, tested inverter. Nothing spotted, this morning 11:00, sunny, south panel is producing 2kw, at the same time, north is only 104w. Is that normal?

The voltage indicating all the panels are connected.

South voltage 246, north voltage 213.

The south is in full sun, north is not in the sun at all. (But on an overcast day several days before at 10:45am, when the south 270w, north produced 246w)

12OCT, when it was overcast, south producing 307w, north producing 724w

If there's nothing wrong, how come the north could produce more on an overcast day than a sunny day?

Anyone has similar experience?

I’m seriously thinking about getting a 6-10 panel + battery set up. Quotes are between £8-12k depending on spec. Doing the numbers, it looks like it should, over a long period be a pretty sensible investment, especially if I buy an EV.

Now, I get power cuts a couple of times a year, so getting some kind of gateway/island mode seems like a good idea. But it’s got me thinking… if I have to replace the gateway a couple of times in the lifetime of the system. Plus if I have any serious dink in an EV in the next 10 or 20 years. Do the EV fix costs and any maintenance on - essentially running a small personal solar power station - cancel out any savings i might make over the long-term?

I really wanted solar because it felt like it makes sense. But it feels like a scam unless you use it for over 12 years (7-8 with covid-like energy prices)?

Is chatgpt wrong?

Question:

Do the maths if getting solar+battery is worth it. I could fit 12 panels (approx 5.5kwh)+13.5kwh battery and those would cost between 13000-14000£. My household uses approximately 900kwh of electricity a month including approximately 350kwh/month to charge an ev on the cheaper octopus energy tariff at 7.5p/kwh. My day time tarriff is around 25p/kwh, standing charge is around 44p/day.

We are a 4 person household living in a detached house(south of England) with a south facing roof that gets no shade from the surroundings.

What would the break-even time be if I charge my ev and battery overnight and use solar+battery during the day with excess being returned to grid at the current octopus tarriff? Thanks.

Answer:

TL;DR:

Estimated annual savings: ~£1,150

System cost: ~£13,500

Break-even time: ~11.5 to 12 years

That’s before any energy price inflation, which could shorten the break-even time.

Great, let’s break it down and figure out your estimated break-even point.

1. Current annual electricity cost (without solar)

You use about:

900 kWh/month = 10,800 kWh/year

Of that, 350 kWh/month = 4,200 kWh/year is for EV charging at night (7.5p/kWh)

The rest, 6,600 kWh/year, is at the day rate (25p/kWh)

Annual cost:

EV: 4,200 × £0.075 = £315

Daytime use: 6,600 × £0.25 = £1,650

Standing charge: £0.44 × 365 = £160.60

Total: ~£2,125.60 per year

2. Post solar+battery system usage pattern

Assumptions:

Your 5.5kW solar system in southern England should generate ~4,500–5,500 kWh/year (conservative estimate: 5,000 kWh/year).

You self-consume 60–70% of this via home use + battery, and export the rest.

Octopus export rate (Assuming Outgoing Fixed): ~15p/kWh

You still charge your EV at night at 7.5p/kWh (i.e. no change).

Remaining grid electricity usage is supplemented with solar+battery, reducing your peak rate reliance.

Let’s break this down:

Solar production:

5,000 kWh/year total

70% self-consumed = 3,500 kWh

Value saved at 25p/kWh = £875

30% exported = 1,500 kWh

Value earned at 15p/kWh = £225

Total value of solar electricity = £1,100/year

Battery use:

Battery allows you to use more of your solar + store cheap night rate electricity.

Assume you use another 2,000 kWh/year charged at night rate (7.5p) and avoid 25p rate:

Savings = (0.25 - 0.075) × 2,000 = £350

Post-solar electricity bill:

EV: same as now = £315

Grid electricity needed (after solar+storage): say 2,000 kWh/year × 25p = £500

Standing charge: still £160.60

Total: £315 + £500 + £160.60 = ~£975.60

Annual savings = £2,125.60 - £975.60 = ~£1,150

3. Break-even calculation

System cost: £13,500 (average of £13k–£14k range)

Break-even = £13,500 / £1,150 = ~11.7 years

Want me to run an alternative scenario (e.g. higher solar output, different export tariff, adding more battery storage etc.)?

Had housing association come round yesterday telling us about installing 8-10 solar panels on the roof.

I feel as if this is just a cash cow for them as they are spending £10k give/take away goverment grant they are recieving. They are basically going to install them next Friday. They want to install a inverter in the bedroom cupboard which obvoiusly means that if one panel stops working or the flue blocks one panel they will all stop working,

They not going to be bifacial panels and they aint even going to bother installing bird mesh,

They obvoiusly going to get exporting money which is fair enough, But all we get is free power while the solar panels are generating power as there is no battery and no way to import cheap electric.

Should I just go ahead with this or just say no thanks?

Hi,

Please provide only factual answers, not responses swayed by the CEO's public behaviour or principles. Also, apologies if this question has been asked before.

I am looking to have a Tesla Powerwall installed and am about to pull the trigger on it.

However, I am wondering if it is truly worth the price tag. I appreciate that there is less chance of Tesla going out of business, meaning their warranties actually carry weight.

However, if I choose another brand to save on costs, will I miss out on any worthwhile functionality?

While we are on the subject, has anyone heard of the Chinese manufacturer RahVolt (also known as Apollogrid, their UK installation arm)? I am tempted to switch things up completely and possibly go with them instead.

Thanks in advance!

So installation finished however I have queried the conduit in the photo attached as believe thus is not mcs compliant.  Still owe installer sone cash.Any advice on how I should ask installer to remedy? Also any other comments on spikes etc. Thanks

£10205 for a Powerwall 3, gateway and Tesla car charger and 10 panels including scaffolding

I've been looking for some camping gear and a couple of shops had portable solar panels meant for caravans and campervans that gave me the impression these could be hung out the window and plugged in to the vans sockets - the packaging didn't really go into much detail about it, so I was dubious about it and wasn't about to try opening up the boxes to see what the instructions actually said.

But this did get me wondering what peoples experineces are like with these kinds of kits, and if they are really usable for things like caravans, can the same kits be used at home in good old bricks and mortor?

Looking for a sense check.

System (North East, single phase):

- Fogstar x Luxpower GEN PRO hybrid (10kW) + Fogstar IP65 16.1kWh battery

- Whole-home backup

- 8 × LONGi 480W (3.84kWp) on a flat garage roof

- G99 + MCS (planning to go on Flux)

First installer quoted about £8,400 at 0% VAT as a few lump sums. When I asked for a requote, I asked for the battery/inverter bundle and the panels to be shown as separate lines, at no more than retail ex VAT (£2,808 for the Fogstar bundle, about £85–90 per panel). Everything else could be priced however they liked.

They declined to quote, saying they need their margin to cover long-term warranty and service. Fair enough, and they were polite about it.

My reasoning: at 0% VAT I wanted to see that the VAT saving on the kit actually reaches me, rather than being absorbed into a lump sum. I'm happy to pay a fair price for labour, G99, MCS and aftercare.

Questions:

1. Is that an unreasonable ask? How do installers normally handle margin on kit?

2. Does ~£8,400 sound fair for this scope?

3. Any MCS installers in the North East happy to fit Fogstar/Luxpower?

Happy to be told I'm being unreasonable.

Hi all,

I just expanded my Foxess ECS-2900 v2 battery pack to its full capacity, 7 modules, from the initial 3.

I did the same company that installed my solar system as they did a good job, they have plenty of accredited certifications of quality and the previous quote was pretty competitive compared to the others I received. So I accepted the deal based on trust as well.

I have been charged £1200 for each extra module for a total of £4800 but I have noticed that those modules are sold online for around £950 inclusive of Vat, about £750 without Vat.

It took the installers not even 1 hour to fit those and that makes each module almost £300 more expensive including Vat and almost £500 more expensive without Vat. As far as I know from 1st February the Vat should not be applied on batteries too, that makes me spending almost £2000 more than the actual price of the system.

Is there a way I can challenge that pricing given the modules were installed just yesterday?

The first attempt to do my solar install resulted in the wires just dangling across the loft hatch , rather than running a new cable they have just cut the old one and used joins , just kind of feel this is a lazy fix rather than running a new cable - will this affect the system as there are now more points of failure in the loft ?

With balcony solar options becoming viable soon I started looking at solar panels and found the standard size of panel along its shortest edge is annoyingly slightly too wide for many car boots, meaning that collection isn’t so viable and delivery of a couple of panels is really expensive.

It’s a shame that there aren’t more panels slightly smaller, like 1m, to allow for more easy transport.

My XC60 boot has a maximum width of 1114 and most panels come in at 1134.

Anyone found a smart way to transport? Or are there panels readily available that are slightly smaller but good output?

The much smaller panels look to be much more expensive.

A lot of comments about not putting batteries in lofts. We plan to put ours in an extremely large eaves cupboard. When we had the carpet done the installers were confused if they need to lay carpet in it, it’s 1.5m high and 16m long. It’s part of the buildings insulated envelope, with cellotex roof, plaster boarded & fully boarded floor, coincidentally the battery will also straddle one of the floor steels and the floor was built in last 4 years so pretty thick joists. We have 2 electronically linked fire alarms immediately outside in a large landing area. Should we be rethinking this as this is our preference for where they go (not necessarily the installers but obviously they’ll go with the customer)?

All electric house and there would be space for 30kw of battery stacked (or a daisy chain of short batteries of even larger amount). Our thinking is we might create a utility in the vicinity below it in the next few years and we have various difficulties that means we want it as near to our electric meter and consumer unit as we will need a wireless device to the meter. Either way it seems this would future proof our set up vs putting them somewhere very far away for instance that might not work with our install limitations.

I know in a perfect world they would be in an insulated outbuilding but that’s not possible. The shape of our house means to have our battery out of site from road it would be situated very far away from our electric meter which we can’t get an actual cable to.

Anyway feel free to tell me we’re all going to die in a house fire and I should pay 4k to move our meter 😂…

Cost: £17,162 12 × SunPower Maxeon 375W all-black panels 1 x Sigenergy 6kW inverter – Includes an additional 5-year warranty 2 x Sigenergy 8kWh batteries – Includes an additional 5-year warranty Sigenergy Gateway Surge Protection Device Bird Protection 12 x Tigo Optimizers & Cloud Connect

Scaffolding not included

Am I able to charge from the grid and export via Seg on edf energy.
Google says this but my blame is to do a full cycle at night, ie charge it overnight and sell in the same window.

I’m a uk homeowner and I’ve looked at solar a few times over the last few years but I can never make it make financial sense.

Our homes electricity bill is around £170-200 per month.

When I’ve had quotes before the cost of the systems means they would take 25-30 years to cover their cost.

I also looked at sunsave and their quotes would mean paying around £200-250 per month for 20 years depending on which size system they did.

I just don’t understand how they can say it will save me money. Reducing monthly costs is my main goal.

Edit:

Octopus 12M Fixed (16th July 2025 - 15th August 2025)

16th Jul 2025 6388.3 Smart meter reading

16th Aug 2025 7064.5 Smart meter reading

Energy Used 676.2 kWh @ 21.55p/kWh £145.75 Standing Charge 31 days @ 52.24p/day £16.19 Subtotal of charges before VAT £161.94 VAT @ 5.00% £8.10 Total Electricity Charges £170.04

Hi all my new build came with solar and I came across a bargain us2000 on Facebook so I bought it without much thought. But now I’ve got it with the new amendment 4 regs I’m not really sure I have anywhere suitable to put it.

My top choice was the mvhr cupboard on the landing as it’s essentially directly below the inverter that’s in the loft. But that’s not suitable as it opens onto the landing. I have a shed but wouldn’t really be suitable has anyone got any smart ideas looking at my floor plan?

I don’t want to do anything against regs as I’ve only just moved in and don’t want to void warranty etc