Every new build house should be fitted with solar panels and a storage battery.
I firmly believe that Every new build house should be fitted with solar panels and a storage battery and here is the reason why.
Back in 2017 I fitted solar panels to the roof of my home and also had installed a Tesla home storage battery. Since that date I have been making substantial financial savings on my home energy usage. If you click the above link you will see my blog post regarding the installation and savings made.
However since the Russian invasion of Ukraine gas and electric prices have soared. Previously I was content with my solar panels generating enough energy for heating my hot water, powering the house and charging my electric car without drawing any electricity from the grid from April until September each year.
The energy price rises this October have made me re assess how I use my Tesla Home storage battery to make more savings in the winter months.
There is a facility with the Tesla battery to download electricity from the grid overnight when the electricity tariff is cheap and use that energy to power the house during the day when energy is much dearer. The below image shows the two settings. Previously I have just used the self powered mode and relied solely on the solar generation but since the middle of October I have started to use the time based control mode.
The energy company I am with, BULB has just such a time of use tariff. The cost for me is 37p during the day and 10.35p (plus 5% vat) during the overnight off peak period which is between 0200 and 0600. The below image is the graph for just one day last month, the 24th November. It shows that there was very little solar generation that day just 4.01 kWh but I consumed 32.28 kWh of electricity.
Of that 32.28 kWh you can see from the red section on the graph almost all of it was downloaded between 0200 and 0600 during the off peak time slot at 10.35 pence as opposed to the much dearer peak rate of 37p. You will see a little red peak around 6pm and that occurs when the oven, hob and or grill, kettle etc get used all at the same time and the 5kWh download speed from the Tesla Battery is not quite enough to cope with the higher demand of all of these appliances on at the same time. It is however a very little amount for a very short time as can be seen by the size of the red blip.
The below chart shows the whole month of November. The very large red peaks are when we charged either of my Kia Niro EV or Karen’s Fiat 500e during the off peak period by setting the timer on our Zappi EV charger. We are also able to set the timer on the washing machine and dishwasher to come on during the off peak period.
November 2022 is the first full month of using the Tesla off peak that I have now received data for whereby I can calculate the savings I have made. Below is the image of my BULB electricity use for November 2022.
As can be seen I used 40 kWh at the peak rate and 244 at the off peak rate making a total of just £58.94. That has powered the house for all the electric use and charged our two electric cars for the whole month. The water is heated during the winter by the gas boiler as is the central heating so is not reflected in these figures. From April to September we do not use the gas at all as the hot water is powered by the solar energy and we do not need any heating during these summer months.
The savings for November by using the Tesla Battery and the BULB time of use tariff are substantial. Had I stayed on my previous standard variable rate I would have paid 32.25 per kWh for every unit of electricity used. That would have been 284 units at 32.25p = £91.59 plus £4.58 vat = £96.17. However I paid just £40.06 (ignoring the standing charge which would be the same) giving me a saving of £56.11.
If this carries on for the 6 winter months I will make a saving of over £336 just by using the Tesla home storage battery to its full potential.
I appreciate not every one can afford to retro fit solar panels and a storage battery. I did in 2017 mainly on environmental issues as at that time electricity was cheap around 13p a kWh and the savings were not the driving factor. However with energy prices now almost 3 times the 2017 price the ability to save on such a big investment has greatly increased.
There is one group of people who can afford to do this and that is house builders. If building regulations required them to fit solar panels and a storage battery to every new home then a massive impact would be made on demand for peak energy from the National Grid. Fitting them as part of the build would greatly reduce the cost of both the battery and panels by purchasing in bulk.
That is why I believe every new build house should be fitted with solar panels and a storage battery, what do you think?
Update 23/12/2022
I have just seen this article on Reuters website (click the link below for the full article)
Tokyo makes solar panels mandatory for new homes built after 2025
It seems Japan sees domestic solar as part of their solution to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. They are mandating all large builders install solar on houses built after 2025. Japan has a particular problem as it switched to coal power stations after the disaster at the Fukushima Nuclear reactor in 2011.
Not only is this a good idea for the environment but it is a money saver for the new house purchaser. Come on Gov UK its a “no brainer”
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