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Solar Panels + Electric Car

Making your money go further
funduffer
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Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362696

Postby funduffer » December 3rd, 2020, 7:20 pm

So here is my plan for the next 3 months:

1. Have a new roof (which is needed anyway), and get solar panels fitted (13 panels 4.225 kWp). Get a smart export guarantee (probably Octopus) - 5.5p per kWh. I already have the smart meter (SMETS 2)

2. Buy an electric vehicle, and have charger fitted at home. Not decided yet which car - maybe VW, Nissan or Kia. Charger would be one that has the option to use excess solar panel power.

3. Switch energy supplier to one that offers an EV overnight rate. There are a few around at 5p-8p per unit for a few hours at night.

4. In winter, use the overnight tariff to charge the car, and the limited solar power in the house.

5. In the summer, use the excess solar to charge the car, and run appliances overnight as far as possible.

I currently have gas combi boiler for heating and hot water - not intending to change that. Current electricity usage is about 3000kWh, without the car. I estimate I may get about 3000-4000miles a year from my solar panels for the car, but not sure about this. I only do 5000-8000 miles a year, mainly short journeys from home.

What could possibly go wrong?

FD

Mike4
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362708

Postby Mike4 » December 3rd, 2020, 8:41 pm

funduffer wrote:
What could possibly go wrong?

FD


In the medium to long term as EV uptake grows, I think it is worth considering what you reckon the govt is gonna do about the progressive loss of fuel duty and VAT. I can't imagine them for one second just taking it on the chin and leaving leccy vehicle fuel taxed at the domestic rate or in your case, mostly not at all.

There are two possibilities I can imagine.

1) They introduce a regulation that EVs may not be charged other than via a separate leccy meter upon which a fuel duty is levied.

2) They use the opportunity to introduce road use pricing by the mile for all vehicles, which will have the side effect of making ICE vehicles really expensive to use compared to EVs, as they'll still be paying fuel duty at the pump, thus speeding the uptake of EVs.

My guess is they will go for 2) to start with, then add in 1). They probably won't do any of this though until the public is fully committed to EVs, so estimating the speed at which EVs become ubiquitous is crucial.

Dod101
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362722

Postby Dod101 » December 3rd, 2020, 9:49 pm

And here was I thinking that the OP was going to have a sort of solar panel fin on the roof of his car. Then he would be self sufficient.

Dod

PhaseThree

Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362723

Postby PhaseThree » December 3rd, 2020, 9:50 pm

My recommendation would be to stick some numbers into a spreadsheet.
As you have noted solar panels don't provide enough output in the winter to charge the car.
This means you need some form of off peak electricity tariff.
If you have an off peak electricity tariff then the payback time for solar panels exceeds their expected lifetime. Particularly if you move big power users to the off peak hours (washing machines, tumble dryers etc.).
In which case solar panels become some form of "eco bling".

So work out how much power you could move onto an off-peak tariff, work out how much usage cant be moved. Work out how much occurs in the winter and how much in the summer. Then work out how many years it would take for the solar installation to pay back it's installation cost.
Anything over 15-20 years is a fail. (Remember this is the "living below your means" board not the "save the planet" board).

I live in a Passivhaus spec house and don't have solar PV because it's not currently cost effective for me for the reasons above.

Note :- Installing anything over 3.68kW requires agreement and survey from your DNO and additional paperwork/cost.

supremetwo
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362724

Postby supremetwo » December 3rd, 2020, 10:00 pm

funduffer wrote:So here is my plan for the next 3 months:

2. Buy an electric vehicle, and have charger fitted at home. Not decided yet which car - maybe VW, Nissan or Kia. Charger would be one that has the option to use excess solar panel power.

What could possibly go wrong? FD


Presume all electric rather than hybrid - new or second-hand?

A new equivalent electric car is almost twice the price paid for our present VW Polo petrol model - at least £25k for electric and we already have solar panels that have paid for themselves (took 7 years under the old FIT scheme).

I'm expecting battery prices and their degradation to reduce and range to increase over the next 5 years so in no hurry to shell out ££££ to be
an early adopter.

JohnB
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362765

Postby JohnB » December 4th, 2020, 12:26 am

Have a look at solar roof tiles if doing the roof, though I think they will work out more expensive than the combinaruin of conventional tiles and panel

Using your car battery bidirectionally would be good, but I think you are just a bit too early

NeilW
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362779

Postby NeilW » December 4th, 2020, 6:59 am

Mike4 wrote: I think it is worth considering what you reckon the govt is gonna do about the progressive loss of fuel duty and VAT.


It isn't lost. It just moves down the chain to the next person that spends the money instead. So the electricity company earning more profit will pay extra tax, and so on down the spending/earning chain.

Duty is there to discourage a particular activity and divert that activity elsewhere. If it goes down, it is doing its job.

After this year it should be pretty clear that in a country like the UK with its own currency, the government has no need of your money. It only takes it to stop you doing things and if the tax is well designed that will free up things the government can then buy to fulfil the public purpose it was elected to achieve.

Taxes for Revenue has been an obsolete concept since at least the 1930s.

Dod101
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362780

Postby Dod101 » December 4th, 2020, 7:07 am

NeilW wrote:
Mike4 wrote: I think it is worth considering what you reckon the govt is gonna do about the progressive loss of fuel duty and VAT.


It isn't lost. It just moves down the chain to the next person that spends the money instead. So the electricity company earning more profit will pay extra tax, and so on down the spending/earning chain.

Duty is there to discourage a particular activity and divert that activity elsewhere. If it goes down, it is doing its job.

After this year it should be pretty clear that in a country like the UK with its own currency, the government has no need of your money. It only takes it to stop you doing things and if the tax is well designed that will free up things the government can then buy to fulfil the public purpose it was elected to achieve.

Taxes for Revenue has been an obsolete concept since at least the 1930s.


Wonderful. Once the Government realises that it is all wrong we will be in the happy land of MMT.

Meanwhile, in the real world..........

Dod

neversay
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362781

Postby neversay » December 4th, 2020, 7:09 am

I have just taken a two-year lease on an EV through my company, partly as my old PHEV is likely to devalue quickly and I've no clue what to buy outright as the technology is dating so quickly. Normally I would never lease or get a new car but the BIK combined with not owning a car actually suits our needs right now.

What I didn't allow for was the Zappi 2 charger still costing £750 to fit, even after the government voucher. We can afford it but it's a lot of EV miles to achieve payback and we're not heavy car users.

The Zappi 2 was recommended as it works with flexible tariffs (like Octopus Go and Agile) as well as solar which I'm considering for our forthcoming extension. In the past when I crunched the numbers it didn't stack up in terms of payback time.

On LBYM terms though I agree with PhaseThree - the EV and the solar feel like 'eco-bling' (I like that phrase). We're not particularly saving the environment and the costs are high.

Again, all the technology on EV, solar and batteries, along with government incentives, are all in flux. By renting the EV I'm getting off the ladder for a short while.

NeilW
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362795

Postby NeilW » December 4th, 2020, 7:52 am

Dod101 wrote:Meanwhile, in the real world..........

Dod


The real world is the one I've described. Hence why you can only sneer, not point out where I'm wrong in a logical and rational manner.

I'm finding MPs, particularly Tory MPs on a manifesto commitment, are very receptive to cogent explanations as to why there is no present need to put taxes up.

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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362812

Postby Gan020 » December 4th, 2020, 8:41 am

funduffer wrote:4. In winter, use the overnight tariff to charge the car, and the limited solar power in the house.
FD


I would like to understand how this works in practice. My rough numbers suggest some planning is required to make your strategy work.

Let's say your panels produce 3.5kW per hour in the peak summer months for a four hour period (that's generous in my experience but we will run with it)

A supercharger uses 22kW per hour so the contribution from your solar is almost neglible. You wouldn't want to do this and you'd be better off charging overnight as the electricity tariff is halved

A typical home charge uses 7kW per hour so your solar contribution is around half. so, that's 3.0kW for free off your roof (I've allowed 0.5kW as other background usage for fridges, things on standby etc) and 4.0Kw at 15p per hour = 60p of electricity per hour. If you run overnight it's 7.0kw at 7.5p = 52.5p per hour. Actually cheaper.

I assume if you plug the car in the wall without a home charger it will draw about 3kW an hour so in this case most of your charging is for free but only for around 4 hours in the middle of the day and in June/July when it's not cloudy. But in four hours you can only charge 14kW total which would be a quarter refill on say a Nissan Leaf. This would seem to work.

Regrettably clouds aren't helpful. Some days you get 3kW for 5 mintues then 1kW for 5 minutes etc so in this case you will be charging for free, then paying for electricity which may lead to it simply being cheaper to plug in overnight for months outside say May-Aug.


My rough numbers seem to suggest that solar roof panels can only provide free electricity for your car for about a quarter of the year if you do about 50 miles a day and if you are disciplined enought to have a timer to charge in the peak sunny hours with the rest topped up overnight.
And if it's cloudy in the four sunniest months to be motivated enough to turn the charger off.


Unless there's some tech to only draw power from your solar and no more?

UncleEbenezer
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362840

Postby UncleEbenezer » December 4th, 2020, 10:14 am

ReallyVeryFoolish wrote:Great plan, look forward to hearing how it goes. I have a PodPoint charger, can recommend it, if it does what you need.

RVF


Pod Point has been EDF for just under a year now[1]. Are they offering you any interesting bundles along the lines the OP is looking for?

[1] Before EDF acquired it, I held Pod Point shares through crowdfunding.

MaraMan
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362851

Postby MaraMan » December 4th, 2020, 10:34 am

Don't want to hijack this thread but we are considering having solar panels fitted. The local council has teamed up with an installer and provides good value, allegedly. Their estimates say it should provide about 50% of our electricity needs, for a cost of around £5,000 for 20 panels.
I can't make up my mind whether this is a good idea or not and wonder if any other more learned lemons have a view?
Thanks
MM
Last edited by MaraMan on December 4th, 2020, 10:40 am, edited 1 time in total.

neversay
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362853

Postby neversay » December 4th, 2020, 10:39 am

MaraMan wrote:Don't want to hijack this thread but we are considering having solar panels fitted. The local council has teamed up with an installer and provides good value, allegedly. Their estimates say it should provide about 50% of our electricity needs, for a cost of around £4,000.
I can't make up my mind whether this is a good idea or not and wonder if any other more learned lemons have a view?
Thanks
MM


Does your electric bill quote an estimated annual usage or cost?

Our electricity bill is £720 a year and includes a plug-in PHEV car and a stupid amount of electronics. That will easily increase beyond £800 with a full EV. So a 10-year payback against your quoted price. (Excluding the opportunity cost of £4k invested elsewhere versus fluctuations in energy costs and cheap electric from year 10 onwards).

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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362854

Postby MaraMan » December 4th, 2020, 10:44 am

They reckon it will give us 38% reduction in electricity requirement from the grid, and 70% if we pay another £2,000 for battery storage. Annual savings of £650 without battery and £800 with (both with feed in tariffs)

MM

dealtn
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362866

Postby dealtn » December 4th, 2020, 11:12 am

funduffer wrote:So here is my plan for the next 3 months:

...

What could possibly go wrong?



Seeing as this is LBYM I am happy with my existing roof, and car come to that. I won't be spending any money on either by way of replacement in the foreseeable future. (But good luck anyway).

swill453
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362868

Postby swill453 » December 4th, 2020, 11:17 am

neversay wrote:I have just taken a two-year lease on an EV through my company, partly as my old PHEV is likely to devalue quickly

If you already own the PHEV, why would it devalue quickly, and why would its devaluation worry you? Have you really done the sums to show that replacing it was the best financial option?

Or did you just want a new car? :-)

Scott.

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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362870

Postby neversay » December 4th, 2020, 11:29 am

swill453 wrote:
neversay wrote:I have just taken a two-year lease on an EV through my company, partly as my old PHEV is likely to devalue quickly

If you already own the PHEV, why would it devalue quickly, and why would its devaluation worry you? Have you really done the sums to show that replacing it was the best financial option?

Or did you just want a new car? :-)

Scott.


You are, of course, correct Scott. :) The PHEV was very cheap to run as most of our miles were on battery, zero road tax, low insurance, high reliability, and I offset much of the running cost by business mileage claims. On the flip-side, the display is very dated, battery only 10 miles in winter, excessive condensation that requires the ICE running to remove, and the kids think it's a granny car :oops: .

The lease is on a great deal and done through my business which will offset corporation tax, have no BIK this year (1% next), and if I understand correctly 50% VAT. I reclaim travel costs against contracts which will continue to offset running costs. My accountant was trying to persuade me to get a Tesla so I'm justifying a more LBYM cheap lease in a final act of cognitive dissonance.

TL;DR yes... I wanted a new car. :)

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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362871

Postby scotview » December 4th, 2020, 11:32 am

We looked at solar panels. The sums were barely break even. The clincher for us not to do it was the fact that our roof was watertight, and the internal timbers were like new. The existing tiles arent made anymore. We didnt want to do the install and end up with a leaky roof.

A leaky roof is a nightmare !

We will now wait until we need to replace the tiles and possibly replace with solar tiles/slates.

swill453
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Re: Solar Panels + Electric Car

#362875

Postby swill453 » December 4th, 2020, 11:37 am

neversay wrote:excessive condensation that requires the ICE running to remove

I always read that as In Car Entertainment. Was wonder how the radio could clear the windscreen...

Scott.


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