National Trust goes Green

The National Trust have been entrusting us with Solar PV projects in the South West as they know the future of the Trust needs to be Green, avoiding use of grid power and driving their carbon footprint down.
This particular project near Dartmouth enabled us to use the steel kitchen roof for system mounting, keeping the system as low profile as possible with respect to the listed building that is nearby.
An ideal system connected directly to the kitchen means that during peak sunshine, the NT will be getting peak customers, thus using most electricity at that time.

If you have any unusual installation requirements, let us know.

Sun power for field studies centre

Sun power for field studies centre, a photo by ChrisRudge on Flickr.

A recent 'Off Grid' solar system we have installed enabling this field classroom to enjoy the benefits of 'mains' electricity at any time.
Low cost systems such as this can be fitted to anywhere without power to provide lights, fridge, etc

Working in all weathers!

Looking through some archive photos, I found this along with a few others of the same day.
The guys were working in Dartmoor in the Winter and got caught in a snow shower that often occurs in that area over the dark winter months.

You have to admit this does show some dedication!

Illumininated Turbines

Illumininated Turbines, a photo by ChrisRudge on Flickr.

Almost forgot to mention we had been invited by Good Energy to exhibit with a couple of other local suppliers at the big switch on day of the new Delabole wind turbines in Cornwall.
Good day, a few contacts, nice people, plus Chris Huhne environment secretary, was there to re iterate the Governments intention to limit investors harvesting huge amounts of Government money via field PV systems. Much of this cash just goes straight offshore to foreign investment companies.

A Free Solar PV installation sir?. No thanks!

Over the last year of the Solar PV Feed in Tariff boom, an outcrop of installers set up to install a 'free' solar PV system onto your home or business have appeared.

These guys have been set up by investment companies specifically to harvest Feed in Tariff payments generated by homeowners systems, leaving the occupiers with minimal financial gain of free to use electricity during daylight hours.

Despite claims by some of these companies, the most anyone could realistically hope to get back as free to use electricity is around £150 a year, while the investing company will rake in £1500 a year FiT payments.

It makes sense to pay for your own system to be installed, avoiding issues such as ownership, and legal wrangles when you come to sell your house, etc

See http://www.which.co.uk/news/2010/09/free-solar-panels-not-such-a-great-deal-231808/ which highlights just how bad this deal is for the homeowner.

New Feed in Tariff rates

From April 1st the now 1 year old Feed in Tariff (FiT) scheme has had the annual inflation review. For this coming year a 4.8% increase will be applied, taking the original 41.3p a generated unit to 43.3p!.

The annual review is based on the previous years perfomance of the Retail Price Index (RPI), and is good news for this coming year.

As an example, a 2.22kWp system could generate around 1950 units a year. Last year, that would have equated to £805. This coming year that will increase to £844... Yay!!