Solar

beer enigma

We're thinking of installing solar for water heating as part of a new extention to the house - has anyone any experience of it ?

Also, anyone any recommendations for installers in Cork ?

cheers

mukki

i am building at the moment and once i though about solar a bit i decided it was madness

normal tank 200-300
solar tank 1700-1800
panels can be €2000 each
the guys have to drill the slates to fit pipes, this will mess with the insulation and risk letting in rain water


i'd imagine that for 6-9 months of the year you will have the heating on for at least an hour a day, which should cover your hot water

for the rest of the time you only really need hot water for showers, so just get a triton electric shower, then you only have to heat the water that you use, 10 minutes in a 9kw shower currently costs 21c (its still 14c per unit i think), so 3 people taking a shower every day will cost about €18 a month

beer enigma

I take your point, but I use a huge amount of hot water with three young children, so showers aren't really feasable for them -

The SEI grants at €250/€300 m2 are also useful, but I've a lot more calculations to do yet. Most of the manufacturers quote 70% of annual hot water through solar which seems a bit high given our 'sub tropical':rolleyes: climate

2 stroke

Don't be put off solar so easily. Much easier to fit to a newbuild than retrofit. Don't deal with someone that "drill the slates", pipes can be brought in through roofvents.
Don't make it all about economics, you can't beat the feeling that you are doing something healthy for the planet. Besides, with all the insulation going into houses these days we are shutting out the suns heat. Solar panels can reverse the flow.

Builderwoman!

Agree with 2stroke...solar is well worth it and fitting to new build is very easy as you do it before slating/tiling new roof. You will get even 20-30 degrees from low winter sun. We have hot water 24/7 and it's not all being heated by our boiler. Ideal for a house with smallies. There are a lot of installers out there so shop around.

beer enigma

Thanks - feeling much more upbeat about it now !

Still a lot of digging round to be done as I think we may have a planning issue on top of everything as Cork Co. Council are sticky on these things & the panels would have to go on the front of the house.

CJhaughey

I stand to be corrected on this but I believe that planning is no longer required for solar DHW panels on the S. side of a dwelling.
By FAR the cheapest solution is to buy the individual components and fit them youself, Germany and Austria have a thriving domestic DIY solar market.
German Ebay is a great place to buy componentry.
A word of warning in a recent test by the swiss solar testing agency, flat panels came out with greater efficiency than evac. tubes.
www.solarenergy.ch has a lot of information on the various types of panels and tubes available on the market It has good testing data as well, with all kinds of efficiency data as well.

NextSteps

We put them in in a recent renovation job, and it was relatively easy as long as you have the whole thing thought through. We put them on the roof of the garage, which could be built at the right angle, with the tank in the garage and insulated pipes from there under the (small, suburban) garden to the house.

I'm looking forward to seeing how they work in summer, as it's hard to tell right now. As far as I can see they run themselves, with little or no maintenance, and I expect them to last for years.

The way I looked at it was that if we're getting a mortgage anyway, we might as well put some of the running costs into that rather than paying big gas bill every month as well as the mortgage. I think they're going to become more and more common.

beer enigma

CJhaughey wrote: »

I stand to be corrected on this but I believe that planning is no longer required for solar DHW panels on the S. side of a dwelling.

A neighbour of ours was turned down two months ago when they applied for planning for solar on the basis that the south facing side of the roof overlooked the road & the panels would not be inkeeping.

I understand there has been a softening to the rules, but not sure if its carte blanche.

SEI just issue a general statement saying 'refer to local planning authority'.....

stiofanD

Andip wrote: »

A neighbour of ours was turned down two months ago when they applied for planning for solar on the basis that the south facing side of the roof overlooked the road & the panels would not be inkeeping.

I understand there has been a softening to the rules, but not sure if its carte blanche.

SEI just issue a general statement saying 'refer to local planning authority'.....

Solar panels are exempt from planning permission if they comply with the following points:

• Less than 12 sq m
• 50cm from the edge of the roof
• no more than 15cm higher than the plane of a pitched roof
• no more than 50cm higher than the plane of a pitched roof

There are other points relating to free-standing arrays, but I guess they don't apply in this case. Basically, if you're solar installation agrees with the above restrictions then it is planning exempt. (For those who want to see the official statutory instrument that brought this into effect, look here)

Personally, I got 30 solar tubes installed on the front of my house last november (the front is south facing). This equates to about 2.6 sq m. I also got an insulated dual coil 200l hot water tank fitted at the same time to replace the existing one which was 30 years old and needed replacing anyhow.

So far, I've been pretty impressed. On a sunny day in February, it has heated the entire tank to 44 deg C, and even during Dec/Jan, it would get the water to 30-35 once the sun came out for a few hours during the day.

beer enigma

Thanks for that StiofanD - out of interest...roughly what did it cost to get you fully set up ?

stiofanD

After the SEI grant is taken into account it cost ~€4000. Thats for tank, 30 tubes, pump station with digital variable speed solar controller, all plumbing and labour.

I'm sure it could be done for cheaper, but I didn't have the time/inclination to do a DIY install.

bertie1

I built a new house last year . We bought the Solar panels from a Cork company & installed them ourselves , http://www.solarpanelireland.com

3 panels + controller came to Euro 2904.00.
300 litre dual coil tank came to Euro 1150.00+ vat ( Tim Cremin heating & plumbing supplies)
The plumber was on site so he just connected up the panels while he was at the rest of the plumbing. He needed to supply pipe, insulation, pressure vessel ,standard circulating pump but nothing out of the ordinary.
We got slate mounting brackets made up to fit in with the slates that were going on our roof and the solar panels bolted on to these( no drilling through slates or damage to the integrity of the roof ( which by the way was a major concern of our roofing contactor but he was very happy in the end)
One of the slate brackets that went on the roof has 3 small chimneys on it ( two for pipes & 1 for cable) which made a very neat job of the roof .
SEi grant came in at Euro 1800.00 . ( our plumber was on the registered installers list)

The result from April - end September 2007 ( hot water with no oil on in the house. We turned the heating on ( underfloor ) at the end of September which supplemented the solar panels in bad weather but even a few days last week they were running away nicely with water at 43C last Wedsneday from the roof.

Over all very happy with the solar panels

sculptor

bertie, Are your panels connected to heating or just dhw. If you have 43c. in your heating thats very impressive.

bertie1

sculptor wrote: »

bertie, Are your panels connected to heating or just dhw. If you have 43c. in your heating thats very impressive.

Hot water only , there is no way they would be good enough to do heating as well. We don't get enough of sunlight diring the winter to heat the water enough not to mention the heating. I got 43 C on Wednesday last but wednesday was very sunny. That is the best I got since January , other days it was well below that

beer enigma

Can the tank for the solar sit in the attic & be pumped or does it have to be in a 'hot press' scenario ?

We're looking to change our radiator heating from oil to gas (combi boiler) so won't need the existing tank & ideally were looking to remove the tank altogether & fit a shower into the bathroom in its place ? just wondering if there's any flexibility for the solar tank ?

sculptor

Bertie, Is that tubes or flat plate? Were you getting enough hot water in spring or autumn?

bertie1

sculptor wrote: »

Bertie, Is that tubes or flat plate? Were you getting enough hot water in spring or autumn?

Tubes, only getting enough hot water if the sun was shining, on overcast day I need to supplement it with the oil heating

It was april last year before I was getting enough , even on sunny days in the winter it heats the water from the bottom of the tank & it could be up to mid 20s before the oil come in in the evening to bring it up the last bit for showers