Solar panels for homes.

[Foo Fighter]

I live on a residential estate run by a charitable group, being charitable myself I will use their own title.

They have been throwing government money at these properties for a while now but nothing makes a shed load of sense apart from the management taking kick backs.

Completely now kitchens and bathrooms where only a few worktops and tiles are needed for example.

The flat next to mine has had three completely new kitchens installed in the nearly eight years I have been here and the idiot rep say's, "We have a duty to re[place the kitchens and bathrooms ever few years". WTAF? I thought they had a duty of care to not throw money down the ceramic receptacle in the bathroom myself.

Lots of bullying in the past which I now resist like, "You have to let me in or I will evict you" after turning up with no appointment etc.

The actual LAW states that "As assured shorthold tenants you BUY your home by the month and have the absoluite right to live in and enjoy it in privacy. YOU the tenant decide who enters not a third party".

The landlords agency state that "You have no RIGHT to enter and must do so with the cooperation of the tenant so make things more agreeable by only attempting to enter WITH AN APPOINTMENT and the tenants agreement".

Anyhoo, they are putting solar panels on SOME of the roofs which I was told, "You have to let me take photographs of the interior of the flat and you have to let me in whenever I want. No photo's, no solar panels, you will save £500 per annum on energy cost's, is that worth something to you"?

There are two major issues on the technical front:-

No battery farm. How do they run a solar panel setup without this?

How do they allocate the energy produced to individual homes?

Seeing as the energy can only be sent into the main grid, how can they say we save anything?

I have spokent to other resident who have had the new windows installed, no saving in energy use and no improvement on the draughts that plague these properties.

I told the local police and they told me to deny access to my flat, the nonsense given is just that. Today another resident told me I have "Red flags" aginst me at haig and they are wanting me out. I feel a hardening of attitude coming on which might take some time to dissipate.

haig was set up as a charity for disabled veterans of WW1 with deiscounted rents lower than council rented homes for those who qualify. my elderly neighbour does not get the discount despite being an ex WRAF officer. The landlord say's, "Oh but that was soooo long ago".

Sorry, chewing nails and spitting rust now.

With the last rent increase, we were told the discount might not be affordable in future, no doubt helped by their profligacy.

 

[Foo Fighter]

I wobbled today. Sorry folks.

 

[southwestforests]

I'm not going to fault you for saying this here, stress involving one's housing is a big stress.

 

[Apophenia]

I'm not going to fault you for saying this here, stress involving one's housing is a big stress.

Indeed. Low-cost housing estates run by charitable groups are great. Except when they aren't. Then, they can be the absolute worst combo of potentates and payment-fiddlers ;p

 

[Orionblamblam]

So long as they're tacking up solar panels, try to make sure they get the *right* ones. A recent hailstorm in Texas trashed many acres of panels... except for the ones that look like they shrugged it off.

I mean, look at this nonsense:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1772777113948397655

View: https://twitter.com/UnwantedBlog/status/1772777113948397655

 

[starviking]

There are two major issues on the technical front:-

No battery farm. How do they run a solar panel setup without this?

How do they allocate the energy produced to individual homes?

Seeing as the energy can only be sent into the main grid, how can they say we save anything?

Sorry to hear about your issues with the landlords - and no need to apologise for wobbling - it happens, and it’s good to share!

As for the issues above - most domestic solar has an inverter associated with it. The inverter changes the solar DC to grid AC, and feeds it into the local grid on a dedicated line.

The inverter tracks how much it sends into the grid and reports that to the electricity utility.

There’s more detail involving how much solar your house uses, if it’s set up for it - but that’s the bare bones of the set up.

 

[southwestforests]

Low-cost housing estates run by charitable groups are great. Except when they aren't.

My reality has become similar but a bit different in details from your situation since a health crash in 2005, and that we seem to reside in different countries.
I am now disabled and qualify for government housing assistance since the Social Security Disability amount has from 2009 to current been anywhere from 200 dollars a month below to 25 dollars a month above the poverty level income amount for a household of 1 as determined by the US Department of Health and Human Services.
My health has never been perfect and short term health crashes have caused lost employment which then caused lost income which then caused housing loss via eviction and then a period of homelessness twice prior to the year 2000. Homelessness is stressful. The potential of homelessness is stressful.

There have been a couple housing threats in the last 15 years which I won't describe, but yes, the stress went sky high quickly.
Fortunately they were ultimately resolved in my favor be it by good luck or divine intervention, either way I'll say Thanks!

Where I live now does not have solar panels but being in the US midwest it would absolutely need to be hail resistant.
Wind energy would work too.
As long as the providers of each understand they will by definition be somewhat intermittent given our highly variable wind levels and sky cover levers as cold fronts from Canada and warm fronts from the Gulf of Mexico do their eternal tango in Missouri.


The following may or may not be of personal interest to anyone, but our local climate would impact the level of continuity of solar and wind power generation;

Missouri Climate Center

Climate of Missouri
Wayne L. Decker
Professor Emeritus
University of Missouri

Missouri has a continental type of climate marked by strong seasonality. In winter, dry-cold air masses, unchallenged by any topographic barriers, periodically swing south from the northern plains and Canada. If they invade, reasonably humid air, snowfall and rainfall result. In summer, moist, warm air masses, equally unchallenged by topographic barriers, swing north from the Gulf of Mexico and can produce copious amounts of rain, either by fronts or by convectional processes. In some summers, high pressure stagnates over Missouri, creating extended droughty periods. Spring and fall are transitional seasons when abrupt changes in temperature and precipitation may occur due to successive, fast-moving fronts separating contrasting air masses.

All of Missouri experiences "extreme" climate events, and such events must be considered part of the normal climate. Though infrequent in occurrence and often very geographically restricted, these �disturbances� produce environmental changes that may not otherwise have happened and that may be relatively long lasting in their effect. Among these extreme climatic events are high-intensity rains, protracted drought, heat waves and cold waves, ice storms, windstorms, and tornadoes. These climatic events, in turn, may lead to other environmental disturbances such as floods, fires, landslides, and abrupt changes in plant and animal populations and distributions. High-intensity precipitation characterizes all regions of Missouri. The town of Holt in northwestern Missouri holds the world record for a high-intensity rain, having received 12 inches within a 42-minute period on June 22, 1947.

The length of daylight in Missouri (including refraction of sunlight), at latitude 39° north (approximately Columbia), varies from a low of 9 hours and 26 minutes on the December solstice to a high of 14 hours and 55 minutes on the June solstice. Thus, the annual range of length of daylight between the two solstices is approximately 5 1/2 hours. Comparable figures for latitude 36°30' north (Missouri-Arkansas state line) are 9 hours and 40 minutes and 14 hours and 30 minutes, an annual range of less than five hours. Comparable figures for latitude 40°30' north (approximately the Missouri-Iowa state line) are 9 hours and 17 minutes and 15 hours and 4 minutes, or an annual range of just less than 6 hours.

 

[Foo Fighter]

Sorry to hear about your issues with the landlords - and no need to apologise for wobbling - it happens, and it’s good to share!

As for the issues above - most domestic solar has an inverter associated with it. The inverter changes the solar DC to grid AC, and feeds it into the local grid on a dedicated line.

The inverter tracks how much it sends into the grid and reports that to the electricity utility.

There’s more detail involving how much solar your house uses, if it’s set up for it - but that’s the bare bones of the set up.

Thanks folks, I feel a bit less of a twit than yesterday.

This site has 20 flats in five blocks, my problem is that they will have little in the way of control but I suppose if it goes into the grid it will then be metered to us in the usual way.

gritish bas have a poor track record and are insisting that the 92 year old upstairs owes £1000 plus for the last quarter. She has a television on some of the day.

 

[BlackBat242]

Sorry to hear about your issues with the landlords - and no need to apologise for wobbling - it happens, and it’s good to share!

As for the issues above - most domestic solar has an inverter associated with it. The inverter changes the solar DC to grid AC, and feeds it into the local grid on a dedicated line.

The inverter tracks how much it sends into the grid and reports that to the electricity utility.

There’s more detail involving how much solar your house uses, if it’s set up for it - but that’s the bare bones of the set up.

If each house/apartment has its own electricity meter then the solar is usually tied into the house wiring after the meter (with or without a separate solar production meter - local utilities decide yes or no), and the house/apartment meter is replaced with one that keeps track of draw from the grid and feed to the grid separately.

The vast majority of already-installed meters just keep track of flow, counting flow to the grid as if it was from the grid - thus the new "bi-directional" meter.

Really old meters, those with the flat disk inside that spins, actually run backwards during "feed to grid" periods, so they aren't as bad.

 

[RochetBrianna]

Usually, if there aren’t any batteries to store the energy from solar panels, any power they generate during the day just goes back into the grid. This won’t lower your electricity bills unless the management has some sort of deal with the utility company to give you credit for the power.It also sounds a bit sketchy how they’re saying you have to let them in for photos to get the panels. If you want to understand more about how solar panel setups usually work and what you could actually gain from them, it might be worth chatting with some solar panel installers Ireland.

 

[Foo Fighter]

A funny thing happened on the way to the battery (Hen) farm......

We have pointed ouit that the roof's requre fixing at least. They did surveys prior ro the solar panels being fitted.

They put panels on the other hald of the block and while they were up there fitting the panels they noticed the chimney breats was about to dissassociate from the resat of the building. Fitted the panels anyway.

A few months later the sent folk around on a saturday to put up scaffolding to remove the panels, to fix the chimney breast. weeks late they sent someone to remove the scaffolding after eventually repointing the chimney breast.

When they removed the scaffolding they smashed up the roof, handling the scaffold poles like javelins and throwing them to the ground smashing up hald the foor tiles on that side.

I reported it on the same day, the wednesday. Friday I repeated the report.

They tell me they have to ASK the contractor if their folk smashed up the roof tiles and it will take weeks to get a reply, some time after that they will send a surveyor to assess the damage. This was a while ago just before a weekend of rain/storm warnings. I eventually got them to send a 24 hour response team and they arrived saturday morning.

Decent folk as it happens. Replaced thirty tiles and moved others so the damaged areas were less likely to leak.

The surveyor came around and surveyed the wrong building but there are five so I can allow a little latitude. He asks me why I complained, the roof on block one is fine. I pointed out I live in block five which confused him until I pointed out that me being concerned about block one was unlikely.

Oh, yeah, I get it.

He then tells me that "It's not like it was before, we talk to each other now"?

I asked if the are all in on the same conversation and using the same language.

"I am within my rights to evict you, I am your commandiong officer".

Short stop story, the panels are off to saty. The roof is unfit to take them and they will have to come off the other blocks too, no idea if or when the roof repair will take place or if/when the panels will be hooked up.

Pretty sure they are just all on the take with huge amounts of government cash going into kickback projects like this across the country.

No wonder we are in the manure generally.

 

[TomS]

Usually, if there aren’t any batteries to store the energy from solar panels, any power they generate during the day just goes back into the grid. This won’t lower your electricity bills unless the management has some sort of deal with the utility company to give you credit for the power.

This varies greatly by location. Where I live, we do "net metering" and any electricity produced by my solar panels that I don't use myself gets fed back into the grid and literally runs the meter backwards. I only get billed when my monthly consumption exceeds production and get credits for when my production exceeds consumption. So I typically have a bill for the very worst summer months with high demand for air conditioning and credits most of the rest of the year (especially winter, since my heat is from natural gas, not electricity.)

My long-term plan to to switch to a heat pump that will save energy on cooling and allow me to dispense with gas for heating. But that has to wait until the AC needs replacing again.

 

[BlackBat242]

In Utah the main utility gives ¢26 credit for feeding the grid with the same watt/hours they would charge $1 for if taken from the grid (it was 1:1 until the end of 2017).

 

[timmymagic]

This varies greatly by location. Where I live, we do "net metering" and any electricity produced by my solar panels that I don't use myself gets fed back into the grid and literally runs the meter backwards. I only get billed when my monthly consumption exceeds production and get credits for when my production exceeds consumption. So I typically have a bill for the very worst summer months with high demand for air conditioning and credits most of the rest of the year (especially winter, since my heat is from natural gas, not electricity.)

My long-term plan to to switch to a heat pump that will save energy on cooling and allow me to dispense with gas for heating. But that has to wait until the AC needs replacing again.

This is similar in the UK. There were all sorts of tariffs available for homeowners to choose and subsidies for solar power.

Heat Pumps will also work in the UK and are being driven forward.

But...the big issue is that homes aren't all suitable for them. And this is purely down to Government and Industry inaction. We've known since the Oil crisis of 1973 and power issues in the 1970's that solar should be on every house, that houses should all be built to a Passivhaus standard at the very least, space should be set aside for battery storage and access for a car to a charger (even if some of those systems hadn't been standardised at the time).

But we allowed the housebuilding industry to lobby to do nothing...and government went along with it...

 

[T. A. Gardner]

Without knowing exactly what the condition of the buildings are, how they were built, etc., I can't say for sure but generally on older pre-80's buildings you are like 1000 times better off upgrading the insulation, swapping out windows for double pane, and other improvements to the energy efficiency of the building than installing solar. It's far cheaper and the ROI is much better.

As for heat pumps / air conditioning, I'd have to see the building before making a recommendation. This is coming from someone who did electrical contracting and is both a professional and 'expert' (using that word reservedly) on building renovation.

In the US, what most landlords of older apartments do is upgrade each unit as tenants move out. I've done the electrical on a number of these removing the asbestos sheathed cabling (wiring), putting in new breaker panels, and bringing the receptacles and such up to code. Insulation, double pane windows, adding ceiling fans, and new drywall are far better than plopping solar on the roof.

 

[Foo Fighter]

Well, when government say there is money available 'for' specific items, which it does, the money grabbers use the opportunity to get on the gravy train.

There are asbestos tiles on the floor for example. I pointed them out, "No, they are your problem". Now we know better and the floor (Wood laminate) I had put down is breaking up. The weird thing about all this is the obvious waste and kick backs.

Number 17 has had three new kitchens in 8 years. Rather OTT. Thge estate was given new kitchens complete, when all required was a few new worktops and fic the buggered weall tiles. The boiler here should have been replaced before I moved in, I saw the job sheets. Nada.

There was a new boiler fitted to number 17. New tenant moves in and it takes 4 months and numerous callouts before they realise said boiler was not connected to the gas supply.

In their defence, recovering from all new windows, putting up my bookcase again resulted in three collapsing to the floor, with book insertion. Lovely jubbly for the diy engineer. Well, if everything went right I would get bored and Amazon bust.

My little bit of logic states that we should use it. Imagine my dismay when I am reminded that the higher up the unfed foodchain, the less 'logic' seems to make an appearance...........