June 2014

June 2014 

So far in 2014 we've only generated 93% of estimate and the months are starting to fall in estimated generation stats - June should be 4KWh less than May.  It's been a bit grey at times so that could be some of it but I think I might also have over estimated the efficiency of the invertor.  Never mind.  We got first payment for it the other week anyway £132 - now got to get the bosskat into making best use when the sun is shining!

June another month down on what it should be.  We generated 403 KWh rather than the 432 estimated so 6.7% less than forecast.   Such is life, I suppose.

Clifton Solar Generation - ESE facing, 3.84KW system	Installed 21st January 2014
	Actual	Estimated	% of estimate
January 2014	17.43
February 2014	123.84	137	90.39%
March 2014	283.73	273	103.93%
April 2014	314.03	368	85.33%
May 2014	408.16	436	93.61%
June 2014	403.07	432	93.30%
Cumulative	1,935.90	1646	117.61%
This Month	806.14	432	186.61%
This month daily avg	13.93	14.40	96.71%
Date	Day	Meter
1-Jun-2014	12.96	1,160.15
2-Jun-2014	12.90	1,173.05
3-Jun-2014	8.86	1181.91
4-Jun-2014	7.10	1189.01
5-Jun-2014	11.00	1200.01
6-Jun-2014	21.27	1221.28
7-Jun-2014	2.73	1224.01
8-Jun-2014	5.33	1229.34
9-Jun-2014	6.66	1236
10-Jun-2014	12.32	1248.32
11-Jun-2014	13.56	1261.88
12-Jun-2014	22.77	1284.65
13-Jun-2014	23.23	1307.88
14-Jun-2014	12.12	1320
15-Jun-2014	3.58	1323.58
16-Jun-2014	17.01	1340.59
17-Jun-2014	13.95	1354.54
18-Jun-2014	10.46	1365
19-Jun-2014	12.70	1377.7
20-Jun-2014	18.39	1396.09
21-Jun-2014	21.14	1417.23
22-Jun-2014	18.86	1436.09
23-Jun-2014	19.51	1455.6
24-Jun-2014	19.49	1475.09
25-Jun-2014	20.27	1495.36
26-Jun-2014	17.54	1512.9
27-Jun-2014	3.10	1516	* Estimated
28-Jun-2014	6.00	1522	* Estimated
29-Jun-2014	11.86	1533.86
30-Jun-2014	16.40	1550.26

May 2014

May 2014

Overall - 408.16 KWh generated about 28 short of estimated but we did have quite a lot of wet weather.

13th May 2014
Hadn't mentioned it before but about a week ago I got a Qualcast Li-ion Cordless Grass Trimmer - 18V. The idea being that we'd charge it up during generation time.  Anyway, it's rained every day since so Tuesday 13th was first opportunity to use it and it worked okay - obviously it's not got as much umpf as a petrol one so it takes a bit longer but I was unable to use up all the battery power so that's a good sign I think.  Also used it to tidy up our allotment so that's a bit good too!

Clifton Solar Generation - ESE facing, 3.84KW system	Installed 21st January 2014
	Actual	Estimated	% of estimate	Meter
January 2014	17.43			17.43
February 2014	123.84	137	90.39%	141.27
March 2014	283.73	273	103.93%	425
April 2014	314.03	368	85.33%	739.03
May 2014	408.16	436
To April	721.6	778	92.75%
This Month	408.16	436	93.61%
This month daily avg	18.55	14.06	131.91%
	Day	Meter
1-May-2014	4.41	743.44
2-May-2014	13.41	756.85
3-May-2014	24.25	781.10
4-May-2014	13.28	794.38
5-May-2014	16.62	811.00
6-May-2014	20.50	831.5
7-May-2014	16.38	847.88
8-May-2014	4.50	852.38
9-May-2014	15.04	867.42
10-May-2014	9.70	877.12
11-May-2014	10.82	887.94
12-May-2014	9.44	897.38
13-May-2014	16.98	914.36
14-May-2014	20.29	934.65
15-May-2014	18.68	953.33
16-May-2014	18.92	972.25
17-May-2014	23.52	995.77
18-May-2014	23.85	1019.62
19-May-2014	18.07	1037.69
20-May-2014	10.60	1048.29
21-May-2014	22.08	1070.37
31-May-2014	76.82	1147.19

April 2014

April 2014

We only generated 85% of the estimate in April so the worse month so far.  Better days to come though hopefully.  Overall the actual power generates is  about 93% of estimate and we've had some cruddy weather so all things being equal it should pick up in the next few months

Clifton Solar Generation - ESE facing, 3.84KW system	Installed 21st January 2014
	Actual	Estimated	% of estimate	Meter
January 2014	17.43			17.43
February 2014	123.84	137	90.39%	141.27
March 2014	283.73	273	103.93%	425
April 2014	314.03	368	85.33%	739.03
	721.6	778	92.75%
This Month	314.03	368	85.33%
This month daily avg	10.48	11.87	88.31%
	Day	Meter
1-Apr-2014	10.74	435.74
2-Apr-2014	4.14	439.88
3-Apr-2014	4.12	444.00	*
4-Apr-2014	5.38	449.38
5-Apr-2014	3.36	452.74
6-Apr-2014	3.02	455.76
7-Apr-2014	3.41	459.17
8-Apr-2014	13.14	472.31
9-Apr-2014	13.62	485.93
10-Apr-2014	7.15	493.08
11-Apr-2014	19.56	512.64
12-Apr-2014	6.86	519.5
13-Apr-2014	11.54	531.04
14-Apr-2014	17.71	548.75
15-Apr-2014	20.87	569.62
16-Apr-2014	20.22	589.84
17-Apr-2014	7.05	596.89
18-Apr-2014	21.56	618.45
19-Apr-2014	7.97	626.42
20-Apr-2014	7.58	634
21-Apr-2014	13.84	647.84
22-Apr-2014	4.78	652.62
23-Apr-2014	8.38	661	*
24-Apr-2014	12.36	673.36
25-Apr-2014	2.47	675.83
26-Apr-2014	11.83	687.66
27-Apr-2014	14.34	702	*
28-Apr-2014	16.63	718.63
29-Apr-2014	10.37	729	*
30-Apr-2014	10.03	739.03

March 2014

March 2014

The PVGis estimate for our installation for March was 273kWh, it's been a good month with some decent weather and we've actually generated over 283kWh.  So after a poor February a bit of an upturn, hopefully April will continue in this summery vein!

Clifton Solar Generation - ESE facing, 3.84KW system	Installed 21st January 2014
	Actual	Estimated	% of estimate
January 2014	17.43
February 2014	123.84	137	90.39%
March 2014	283.73	273	103.93%
This Month	283.73	272	104.31%
This month daily avg	9.23	8.77	105.21%
	Day	Meter
1-Mar-2014	11.08	152.35
2-Mar-2014	2.49	154.84
3-Mar-2014	11.58	166.42
4-Mar-2014	7.46	173.88
5-Mar-2014	5.72	179.60
6-Mar-2014	1.90	181.5
7-Mar-2014	6.35	187.85
8-Mar-2014	3.32	191.17
9-Mar-2014	14.27	205.44
10-Mar-2014	13.22	218.66
11-Mar-2014	9.43	228.09
12-Mar-2014	6.28	234.37
13-Mar-2014	11.58	245.95
14-Mar-2014	11.91	257.86
15-Mar-2014	8.63	266.49
16-Mar-2014	11.70	278.19
17-Mar-2014	6.81	285
18-Mar-2014	5.45	290.45
19-Mar-2014	11.94	302.39
20-Mar-2014	6.43	308.82
21-Mar-2014	14.59	323.41
22-Mar-2014	11.40	334.81
23-Mar-2014	11.46	346.27
24-Mar-2014	17.93	364.2
25-Mar-2014	2.92	367.12
26-Mar-2014	8.78	375.9
27-Mar-2014	7.96	383.86
28-Mar-2014	9.81	393.67
29-Mar-2014	15.30	408.97
30-Mar-2014	8.54	417.51
31-Mar-2014	7.49	425

Well it's starting off nicely, nice sunny day not renewed my golf subs unfortunately so down to the lotty later.
The estimate for March according to pvGis is twice as much generation as February - 272 kWh so there must be better days on the horizon you'd hope.

24th March - top day 17.93!
25th March - another rubbish day 2.93!
6th March - rubbish day! 1.9?

25th March 4:30ish spoke to a very scottish chap at Scottish Power:
Gave them a call to find out where my FIT application was they said I should be getting the FIT number any time now and that it would be backdated to 2nd Feb when application was received.

Purchased 3 x mechanical timer switches for a tenner and got the boss one of them Air Ram G-Tech hoover things.  The idea being to charge it from 10am to 2pm to use up some of the generated leccy.
Monday 3rd March 2014\

Things that look good about it are that it runs on 22v lithium ion battery for up to 40 minutes which will hopefully be enough.  It weighs about 7lbs which is hopefully not too heavy.  As it runs on battery it means no plugging / unplugging apart from putting it on charge.  It also makes nifty little bricks of dust instead of a bag to empty.  But perhaps the biggest plus is that it's a neat way to store some of the excess leccy we will be generating.  It also comes with a five year warranty and it uses less power in any case.

Am seriously thinking about getting an Intuition system to see how much of the free leccy we're actually consuming and how much we're generating.

February 2014

Generation:

February Summary:  our system generated a smidge under 12h kWh.  The PVGis estimate for our system was 137 kWh so overall we were down by about 10% generating on average about half a kWh less than it should have.   That said, we have had some really wet rubbish weather so to got what we did isn't a bad result.

Clifton Solar Generation - ESE facing, 3.84KW system
Feb 2014 Actual	123.84
Estimated on PVGis	137.00
Shortfall	13.16
Shortfall %	9.61%
Installed 21st Jan	Day	Meter
January		17.43
Feb Daily Average Estimated	4.91
Feb Daily Average Actual	4.42	-0.49
1-Feb-2014	5.26	22.69
2-Feb-2014	5.60	28.29
3-Feb-2014	1.01	29.30
4-Feb-2014	3.41	32.71
5-Feb-2014	0.58	33.29
6-Feb-2014	1.48	34.77
7-Feb-2014	3.42	38.19
8-Feb-2014	4.58	42.77
9-Feb-2014	1.92	44.69
10-Feb-2014	5.69	50.38
11-Feb-2014	2.72	53.1
12-Feb-2014	0.76	53.86
13-Feb-2014	9.22	63.08
14-Feb-2014	2.28	65.36
15-Feb-2014	0.45	65.81
16-Feb-2014	10.08	75.89
17-Feb-2014	1.27	77.16
18-Feb-2014	3.38	80.54
19-Feb-2014	3.44	83.98
20-Feb-2014	4.93	88.91
21-Feb-2014	8.28	97.19
22-Feb-2014	10.89	108.08
23-Feb-2014	0.80	108.88
24-Feb-2014	5.03	113.91
25-Feb-2014	5.29	119.2
26-Feb-2014	11.00	130.2
27-Feb-2014	7.30	137.5
28-Feb-2014	3.77	141.27

Tuesday 26th February 2014
11kWh - best day yet.

Monday 25th February 2014
Not too bad a day - 5 kWh generated still .89 off the expected average for February - needs four good days.

Saturday 22nd February 2014 - First month of generation
In London we was so got the lad to do the reading - after a really sunny day we nearly got 11 kWh generated.  So for first calendar month we're well over a 100 kWh produced.  Could do with a few more good days as Sunday 23rd was rubbish generating less than a single kWh. Such is life.


Friday 14th February 2014
Valentine's day and loving yesterday's figures 9.22 - well above average for Feb but making Wed and Thursday about average!

Thursday 13th February 2014

Rubbish day yesterday - less than a  kilowatt hour generated.  At least today is looking brighter.

Have added daily average to the spreadsheet.  At the minute we're about a third down on what it should be generating - need some good weather to turn it round really and at the minute it's just a bit rubbish!

Saturday 1st February 2014
- not  a bad day at all - working up in attic so took this shot off the inverter!

Tuesday 4th February 2014

I suspect something may have gone wrong with the electricty - just logged onto my provider's website to look at consumption and it looks like we're using next to nowt.   Can't be right. 

Friday 7th February 2014

Sat at work, stuck inside, looking at sunshine out the window and thinking - ha ha generating a bit of income today.  Not much but I bet it's something like 7 today - will see when get home.

January 2014 - and so it begins!

January Pre-Prep
Much of the lead-up to the solar going in was taken up by getting a floor into the loft-space.  We banged down 2x1" slats over the rafters so we didn't need to worry about any wiring sitting on top of the rafters getting crushed and then got 8x2' loft flooring boards screwed down onto them.  All good stuff.

Monday 20th  Jan 2014 : Installation Day #1
The people from the Renewable Shop arrived at 8:50 - loads and loads of 'em.  They were having to do two installations in Ashbourne at the same time so they wanted scaffolding up quick then half of them disappeared to the next job.  We were left with the nucleus of five guys who over the course of the day would get most of the fittings on the roof, the invertor up into the loft (they weigh a ton, not quite literally but they're damn heavy).  Also the internal wiring was done so that day 2 would be a case of finishing off the fittings and then getting the panels connected up.  There was a bit of luck with the wiring in that there was the old immersion heater wiring going down to the cubby hole where the meter is and up into the roof space so that saved a bit of time.

Getting roof fittings done

Invertor and internal wiring done

Tuesday 21st  Jan 2014: Installation Day #2

The state of play at 4:30 in the afternoon job almost done bar taking away the scaffolding.

Wednesday 22nd  Jan 2014
Not much to report today.
Went up the attic to do a bit of a tidy up and prep for finishing off the floor - we had left the bit near the access point clear in case they needed to do any wiring stuff.

Picture of invertor - 'strings' to solar panels coming out and going up the chimney!

Meter read 2.41, I think it began on .41 when it was commissioned on Tuesday.

Thursday 23rd Jan 2014

Meter reading a smidge under 7kWH so best generating day so far.  

Friday 24th Jan 2014

EPC being done today so should be able to get paperwork off soon for the FIT tarriff. 

Tom from The Renewable Shop came along to finalise the paperwork - have a ton of stuff to send to Scottish Power not to mention insurance and what have you. 

Been a bit of a glum day so not expecting much generation.  Some things I need to not forget about the system:

1). To see what the invertor is generating at any given point you simply tap the display on the invertor.  

2). To shut it down if we get any electrical work done you need to pull down a lever under the invertor and the do the cut-off switch 

3). In the event of a powercut the system will take three minutes to be sure that all is well and start generating again.

4). If it's a red hot day the output may go down as the panels are less efficient when red hot.  

5). Panels will get grebby give em a clean in March and if possible September - don't use detergent though.

A poor generating day today - wet and horrid:

Just under 1.3kWh generated yesterday with the cruddy weather we had.

Saturday 25th January 2014

Sun is out at 10am - very low angle of course in Winter but the meter is flashing and we're generating a bit of leccy which is a good consolation seeing as the golf course is shut and it'll be another weekend with zero golf.

Tiny bit of blue sky - not a bad generating day

According to the inverter we got 3.28kWh generated today - bit better than yesterday.

Sunday 26th January 2014

Should have been happier with the generation yesterday as today's has been all but non-existent as it's rained pretty much constantly all day.  

I reckon about .3 kWh produced today - very poor indeed! 

Monday 27th January 2014

At work all day but it didn't look like anything to write home about so was pleasantly surprised to see 3.1 something generated.  All good stuff.

Tuesday 28th January 2014

A bit of weak day's generation but the first week's total generation is about 16 kWh

This means the average daily production has been 2.33 kWh which is under the PVGis estimate for January for our system which should have been 2.79kWh

Wednesday 29th January 2014

If I thought it was bad yesterday, well it was more of the same today as well.  .46 kWh generated.  

Thursday 30th January 2014

Another really bad day snow and rain and all sorts - surprised to see any generation at all so .6 of a kWh is better than I expected.

Friday 31st January 2014

Possibly the worst day so far - added just .12 kWh.  So in the last ten days of January 2014 we managed to generate a 17.43kWH which is well under expectation.

Solar - how did that happen?

In November 2013 my father got solar panels - I think mainly due to disappointing savings and ever-increasing energy costs he thought it would be a good investment.  It took a fair bit of and is still taking a fair bit of convincing to get the missus on board with it but I think she is beginning to see the light too - interest rates as low as they currently are mean money in the bank is becoming devalued whereas in a few years time solar will be making us money (hopefully).

December 2013
We saw various suppliers in December and quickly decided we liked Tom Mastin's company The Renewable Shop. They are based in Darley Dale (not more than half a mile from my mum and dad's house!).  The cool thing about solar is you pretty much have to shop local - Amazon don't get a look in with this!   We liked Tom's company for a number of reasons - good price, thorough job of checking that the installation would work and they came across as nice people to work with.

http://www.therenewableshop.com/


How much would/should it generate/return on investment etc?

A good site to use to get an idea of likely generation is to go to
Photovoltaic Geographical Information System - Interactive Maps
at http://re.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pvgis/apps4/pvest.php

Solar radiation database used: PVGIS-CMSAF Nominal power of the PV system: 3.8 kW (crystalline silicon) Estimated losses due to temperature and low irradiance: 11.7% (using local ambient temperature) Estimated loss due to angular reflectance effects: 3.4% Other losses (cables, inverter etc.): 5.0% Combined PV system losses: 19.0%

Fixed system: inclination=40°, orientation=-65° Month Ed Em Hd Hm Jan 2.79 86.4 0.86 26.6 Feb 4.91 137 1.50 42.1 Mar 8.78 272 2.73 84.6 Apr 12.30 368 3.94 118 May 14.10 436 4.58 142 Jun 14.40 432 4.76 143 Jul 13.70 426 4.57 142 Aug 11.70 363 3.87 120 Sep 9.32 280 3.01 90.3 Oct 5.75 178 1.81 56.2 Nov 3.47 104 1.07 32.1 Dec 2.42 74.9 0.75 23.2 Yearly average 8.65 263 2.79 85.0 Total for year 3160 1020 Ed: Average daily electricity production from the given system (kWh) Em: Average monthly electricity production from the given system (kWh) Hd: Average daily sum of global irradiation per square meter received by the modules of the given system (kWh/m2) Hm: Average sum of global irradiation per square meter received by the modules of the given system (kWh/m2) According to  http://re.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pvgis/apps4/pvest.php So in theory our ESE facing roof should generate 3160 kilowatt hours of electricity per annum.    We're signing up to the Feed in Tarriff where we get paid to generate PV electricity which  means we will be paid 14.9p for every kilowatt hour we produce (called the FIT rate) and an additional 4.9p for half of the power we produce (called the FIT export rate)  - the assumption being that we will use half the electricty we generate). So in the first year we should get 3160 x 14.9p + 1580 x 4.9p meaning a cheque of about £548. We will also be expected to use about half of the electricity which is seen as a benefit of about £189 so the saving in year one is about £733 So that's on the bad side £730 odd quid in year one.  However, the important thing to note about FIT is that it's not metered going back into the grid if your system is 4K or less, SO you can use 100% of the power you use!  Which means if we're clever and switch on stuff when the sun doth shine we will do even better. Another reason I've done it is that it's ecologically good, and it gives me a better understanding of climate and seasons just as doing the allotment does.