Domestic Solar PV Quotes 2020

SouthWesterly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118039605#Comment_118039605

I had filled in a form which sent to multiple suppliers

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118039820#Comment_118039820

Quote 1 is a monster of a setup (in a good way), that would be the one for me. I'm guessing the inverter is 6kw.

They can be portrait and landscape, yes wattages can be mixed. I can't remember the regs on edge distance but if its a grant job it will be perfectly fine as the SEAI have overly strict rules.

If you go for quote 2 I can nearly guarantee you will be kicking yourself for not going bigger. This solar gig is an addiction, because ya just want more.

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118039655#Comment_118039655

Get a smaller battery if that's what you feel, you might as well as a grant is available for it.

Get requited with a smaller battery, you can add more in the future.

murt101

If anyone wants to PM me the details of some suppliers its be appreciated, thank you.

A couple of weeks ago I sent off enquiries to 4 companies, 1 rang me and went through everything and followed up with a written quote. 2nd rang and gave rough quote, not much detail and no written followup. Haven't heard from rest yet...

rx8

PM Sent. Early start for both of us today. Good luck.

championc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118039820#Comment_118039820

Have you considered going the DIY route since you say you don't qualify for the grant. It"s not all about making financial sense but your payback without a grant could easily be over20 years (and the inverter may only last 10 before needing replacement).

With such a huge roof, it sounds like you have a bungalow, making DIY a hell of a lot simpler for those who are nervous about getting onto their roof.

The only thing you need is to nominate a sparks on an NC6 Form to the ESB, to go DIY

PureBred

Another quote from recommended supplier on boards same as @DrPhilG:

16 PANELS 340 WATT 5.44 KW JA SOLAR 25 YEARS GUARANTEE

5 KW.HYBRID SOLIS INVERTER

4.8 PYLON TEC. BATTERY

EDDI WATER DIVERTER

WI FI DONGLE

PRICE 10900 EUROS INC.VAT..

I asked for a quote without battery, eddi, etc and he said 1500 less. Doesn't sound right to me. Seems installers are charging 3k to install the system on average. Looks like i'm going down the DIY route.

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118040180#Comment_118040180

Quote looks decent. Almost exactly the €1,000/kWp benchmark.

By removing battery, you are losing €1,200 of grant.

buzz11

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118039820#Comment_118039820

mixing portrait & landscape -- dunno

Mix wattage of panels -- I've been told by wholesale supplier that this isn't recommended, dunno technical reasons though

Gap between edge of roof. SEAI rules are minimum 200mm from top ridge tiles and 500mm from all other edges and I think they are getting this from UK best practice. I've googled this a lot for my own garage self install and some advice is 200mm from all other edges. I think you need to use common sense based on the wind/storm experience that you have of your own house.

Higher wattage panels -- keep an eye on size and weight of panels if your doing the fitting & lifting the Qcell 450w is 25kg!

The biggest issues that I found with self install on my garage was figuring out a water-tight way of getting the cables into the attic

Jim_Cannon1890

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118036659#Comment_118036659

Thanks a lot for the answer.

If A included a decent sized inverter (I've asked), why would I not be better off with them, given they're doing BER and grant (worth a couple of hundred I think), and given daytime usage and coming onboard of the FIT, the extra size battery probably isn't worth that much to me?

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118042002#Comment_118042002

Fair enough good point. I just assumed option B included the grant work.

AndyBoBandy

Jesus lads the 340w panels are flucking massive!!!! The guy was carrying them in and I never realised how big they are!! They're as big as him!!! even up on the roof they look so much smaller!!!

And I'm getting 17 of them!! so 3 above the initially quoted 14 panels!! Eddi is installed as well as a Harvi & a Hub.

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118042940#Comment_118042940

You actually reminded me of me when I got the panels in. Enjoy it ya big kid. Christmas has arrived.

Jonathan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118042940#Comment_118042940

Ha. And they are the small panels at approx 1000x1700. The 450W panels are enormous.

idc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118039954#Comment_118039954

I thought with mixed wattages on the same string the higher watt panels will drop to level of lowest panel - unless all panels have optimisers?

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118043211#Comment_118043211

Thats true. I have 310watt and 320 with noted issues Tbf they are all optimised now.

adropofred

Had a guy called to my house yesterday which sparked my interest in Solar.

Our situation.

Two of us retired and in the house most day. We used 7000 kwh in last 12 months - We have an EV and a Garro home charger. 57% of kwh were used on the night rate.

Quotation I got :

• System size: 6KW - 18 PV Panels – will be distributed on SE and SW facing roof.
• Diverter - is this the same as Inverter? I think he mentioned Solis !
• 2.4 KW battery - Don't know is it worth getting this - Sales guy said it was only used when the Grid is down but I am not so sure!
• Boost for hot water

Total cost: €13,000 including VAT - 10k after grant

Without the Battery it works out at 7.5k after grant

25 Year guarantee except Battery which is 8 years

Does this sound reasonable?

Can someone give me a list of reputable installers?

Many Thanks

DrPhilG

Terrible prices.

Second one isn't too bad on the face of it, but I'd love to know how he's adding €2.5k for a battery given that it only costs at most half of that, and part of that would then be covered by the grant.

Adf to that the fact that the salesman claims the battery is only used when the grid is down and I'd run a mile.

I'll PM you my installer.

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118044434#Comment_118044434

A Diverter is a fancy name for an immersion switch. It switches on the immersion when it detects power being sent freely to the grid. Its the same as Boost for hot water.

No harm in having a battery as it can cover some cloud cover and prevent you buying from the grid.

That price can be bettered.

PM sent.

DrPhilG

Not sure if this is the right place for it or not but here goes.

What are my options for off grid power? I'm in the middle of another 5 hour power cut here in the wilds of Donegal and its pissing me off.

I've got probably 10kWh of juice in the batteries but no option to use it.

I know that the Solis can have a socket wired to the backup port but that would just give me basically an extension lead to plug in a few essentials.

I also know that I can't just run the whole house off the inverter/battery as is, due to the risk of electrocution the nearest esb guy.

But I've heard of some folk who have a trip switch situation whereby if the power drops, they can switch over to the off grid setup. I believe it required some requiring of circuits to isolate from potential export and electrocution but anyone have details on this, and potential cost?

Living in the sticks and having your car stuck behind electric gates that I can't open if there's an outage is irritating.

*and just like that, the power is back...

DrPhilG

I'll speak to my installer tomorrow but I do recall that most of the guys who quoted me said either that it wasn't possible or prohibitively expensive.

Which usually means that it's a pain and they don't fancy it. Can't recall if my Enniskillen installer gave me any info on it, as I may not have asked having already been put off the notion by the half dozen before him.

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118044434#Comment_118044434

Not the worst quote I've seen, but I think you can improve on that and save yourself a few quid. Similar to Maulbook - I'll PM you a company to ring an get a quote from. With an EV I'd be looking for 6Kpw, so you'd be able to charge the EV in the summer months. 5Kwp in panels would do too, but if you read this thread for any length of time, you can never have too many panels!

Couple of things. Virtually every solar & battery installation will be inoperative in a power cut. It is technically possible to wire one safely, but typically this isn't a done thing for a variety of reasons I won't go into here.

Normally I'm pro-battery, but with the EV and your usage, I'd probably think long and hard about a battery. You can effectively use your EV and hot water diverter as your store for excess energy - it's not a terrible decision to get one, but I'd probably pass if i was you.

slave1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118045452#Comment_118045452

AFAIK, storage controller like the Sofar 3000 have an EPS function that can kick into house back up mode but I'm not up to speed of full functionality

MAULBROOK

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118045470#Comment_118045470

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118045470#Comment_118045470

 prohibitively expensive usually translates to thay couldn't be arsed.

The simplest way would be to run one dedicated socket from the backup to the house that is only to be used during a power failure.

Yes its a pain but it will limit you to pure essentials only and get the most out of your battery.

idc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118045478#Comment_118045478

Most hybrid inverters now a days have some form of backup power. Be it a single socket, cable to a sub consumer board with a small number of essential circuits or a full setup with an isolation switch allowing all circuits operate and reopen the fire safety switches for the solar panels. Its the one feature most people unfamiliar with solar don't realise is that in a power cut you have no power yet you'll have a battery or have the sun beaming down on you! When I was getting quotes there were two types of installers -- those that regularly install some form of power cut backup and had no problem quoting with prices and those that basically didn't want to do it. Obviously a single or 2-3 sockets attached will cost little to nothing to do, but if it involves reconfiguring consumer unit or transfering some circuits from one board to the other that does increase the cost of this.

SlitDrip

Living in the sticks and having your car stuck behind electric gates that I can't open if there's an outage is irritating.

Surly you know how to use the manual bypass?

DrPhilG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118046201#Comment_118046201

The locks are seized up. Awaiting the installer to come back and fix them.

adropofred

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118045478#Comment_118045478

A couple of thoughts came to me last night which may add to my overall costs...

Query 1

My EV charger (Garro) is not Solar aware so will I

1. have to change it to a Solar aware charger or
2. can I use my existing car charger as part of the house load?

Query 2

We have a Electric shower and a Power shower ( comes from immersion) and both coming to end of life.

Should I be looking at 2 power showers or 2 electric showers or does it matter much?

LimerickCity

Good morning folks,

I have recently been requesting quotes for solar PV on our home and had a few people call to the house at this stage.

Only two of us in the house and we use approx 3000 kWh/Year. We are also restricted to approx 8 panels on the rear of the house which gets the sun from 10.30am until in sets in the evening.

We are both at home full time so have the option to utilise the energy when available.

One of the best quotes I have thus far is for a 2.72 kWp Solar Photovoltaic System which consists of the following:

Install 8 No. 340W Qcell Solar Panels (2.72kWp)

25 year product & performance warranty

Supply and fit Van Der Valk bracketry system to support panels

Roof inspection & wind load analysis

ESB Connection

Safe Electric Certification

Free Lifetime System Monitoring

Huaewi Sun2000 3KLT inverter with 10 year warranty. This converts the DC voltage generated from your solar PV panel to AC voltage so it can be used to power your property.

Supply and fit Solar iBoost to maximize the use of the free solar energy generated by your system. iBoost diverts excess solar power to your immersion (rather than sending it to the grid), heating your water through your solar system.

Building Energy Rating (BER assessment - required for SEAI grant)

Expected annual output is 2,542 kWh/Year

Grant of €1800

Cost after grant is €5800

This crowd also installed our boiler previously and the installation went extremely smooth so edging towards them again.

What are you opinions on this?

Based in Limerick

bullit_dodger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118046564#Comment_118046564

I don't have an EV - so I may not be the "best" person to answer this, but your existing EV charging solution should work seamlessly with the solar installation - no change. The EV charger doesn't care where it gets your electricity from. It will pull from the one with the highest voltage which is invariably the solar installation in your house.

So your typical electric shower will wolf down 5-9Kwh (5kw at 1 bar , 9Kwh at 2 bars). Solar won't be able to supply all that unless you have a mammoth set of panels. Your question is a hard one to call, as it depends on your usage. Personally, I'd probably get in an EDDI (hot water diverter) for some your excess in the summer months, and then have a 1.5/2.0 Bar pump at the immersion - but of course during winter months you will be getting practically zero hot water from solar, so you'll have to have some way in heating the water.