Plug-in solar panels are now legal in Great Britain!
Hopefully this reduces the barrier to people getting solar at home.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/households-can-save-as-plug-in-solar-panels-come-to-market
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@neil I can’t help feeling that it’s extremely poor planning to launch plug in solar just as solar output is about to plunge towards the winter minimum.
@neil not batteries, not zero VAT, and not covered by your home insurance. Definitely do 2 panels and a micro inverter if you can though!
We are VERY happy with our ‘plug-in’ solar system with 4 panels and a battery that we had professionally installed earlier this year. The VAT savings covered half of the labour costs, and I wasn’t the one lugging massive panels around!
@neil Oooh, that IS good.
@neil Oh! THAT'S why there are dark skies and thunderstorms. It's always the government's fault. 😉
More seriously, this is brilliant news. For a smaller upfront fee folks can get a technology that will save them money on their energy bills and renters can take it with them when they move.
@John_Loader @john @neil that's what I thought, are they even going to still be working that long?
@Tattooed_Mummy @John_Loader @john @neil the panels themselves, almost certainly - solar panels have an official lifespan of nearly 30 years and even after that it's loss of percentages in efficiency not sudden death. The inverters and controllers might have a shorter lifespan though, and I'd be very wary of anything that needs a proprietary app to operate
@afewbugs @Tattooed_Mummy @John_Loader @john @neil solar systems that require any kind of cloud service or manufacturer involvement to configure and monitor them are a real nightmare. it's not just because the manufacturer might go out of business and the cloud service can disappear, but because a lot of the manufacturers delegate support to the system installer, so if the installer goes out of business (very common) you can be left in limbo land and getting support becomes very high friction.
