Doing some maths on our solar panels and battery.
Last month, we only paid for 10% of our electricity!
I'm now crunching the numbers to see just how much the 4.8kWh battery has saved us.
+
=
These aren't the final numbers - but are pretty indicative.
In the last 12 month, having 5kW of solar panels, and a 4.8kWh battery, has saved us a massive two-thirds of our electricity bill!
And that isn't even taking into account how much we sold back to our neighbours.
More maths!
Over the last 12 months, we purchased about 1.2MWh from the grid.
Across the same time, we sold 1.2MWh back to the grid!
I think that means our #solar panels and battery have got our domestic consumption down to #NetZero!
It also knocked about £750 off our electricity bills.
Now I just need to find a way to replace our gas boiler. Sadly can't have a heat pump.
@Edent what's your barrier to going heat punk?
@Edent are you in a conservation area? If not then at least two of the restrictions you list may (no longer) apply, and the rules continue to be relaxed further. I am also in a terrace but I think that we are going to be able to make a heat pump work.
@Edent BTW solar diversion into a compact heat battery currently does most of our DHW.
@ryanc @Edent My battery is low power (and I cannot command it in any useful way) and so I do not expect it to interact in any special way with a heat-pump, any more than it does with the heat battery. I do not expect solar to make any significant contribution to space heating. I do now get most of our hot water without gas, from solar, and quite a lot from the grid when low carbon.
@vksxypants @DamonHD yes, but the cost of retrofitting air conduits through the whole house is prohibitively expensive.
@Edent @vksxypants Are you aware of multi-head per-room mini-split units? Particularly given that you could heat some rooms with your IR units...
@DamonHD @vksxypants Interesting! Sadly, I think they still fall foul of my permitted woes. I'll do some more investigating.
@Edent @vksxypants The rules are continuing to unbend, though mini-splits may not benefit yet from grants or GDPOs. If you find out, please say.
(Given that I am doing a PhD on decarbonising UK home heating, I am unreasonably interested in the detail!)
@Edent I wonder how big of a battery one would need to use all of it yourself. I have an inkling that there's enough seasonal variation so that an EV wouldn't be enough.
@hirvox In January - the worst month - we purchased 192kWh of electricity.
A long range EV is about 70kWh.
I'm trying to do the maths on what size we'd need to save the summer excess.
@Edent if you do figure this out, I would be fascinated to hear how, because I also want shot of our gas boiler and also can't get a heat pump!
@jon @skylar
I'm experimenting with Infrared heating.
https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2022/03/experiments-with-far-infrared-heating/
Seems to work in small rooms, heats up quickly, relatively low electricity use.
Also have an electric tap for a basin. Again, fairly reasonable. But running a bath with it would be tricky.
@Edent It is a shame you can’t have heat pump. We had ours installed last week.