Green Building Forum - Investment in PV Tue, 19 Dec 2023 08:20:08 +0000 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/ Lussumo Vanilla 1.0.3 Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289909#Comment_289909 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289909#Comment_289909 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 00:30:21 +0100 Jamster
We have a v small farm / large smallholding and it features a mobile phone mast. This is at the end of its lease and we're into the early stages of being railroaded into a new one. If you're not familiar with this, there is a new 'code' which reduces a) landowners choice in having a mast and b) what the telecoms infrastructure companies offer landowners for rent, etc. So, for now lets ignore the rights and wrongs - this is just background.

Some of the settlement options proposed are a lump sum rather than yearly rent; a disadvantage of this is that its taxable (fair enough) as a business profit if we can't invest it / spend it.

As well as the usual farm money pit options, I've looked at using a lump sum as an investment in renewables on our land. We've a good steady wind, but planning would likely be a pain and would eat up a chunk of our investment pot. So I've thought more about PV - we have south-facing domestic panels so have generation data since April 2018. Planning is likely to be simple if not permitted development, we have a three-phase supply and land that would get an unobstructed level of any sun. Panels would be ground mounted.

I want to model a few scenarios and wanted to seek your input on what options to think about. Overall investment pot could to be 20k to 30k including some top up from other funds. My very quick and dirty numbers convert a figure of £1800 year rent (over 10 years) to £2800 / yr (for greater than 10 years) based on last years domestic generation and option 1, below.

1) All funds spent on PV panels and infrastructure. Export tariff of 5.5p / kWh.
2) Combination of panels with battery storage allowing us to potentially access something like Octopus Agile Outgoing with a variable export tariff. We would be able to orientate the panels to charge the batteries to be ready to discharge at the optimum period.

Am I missing anything? I know I'll not retire on this, but it seems worth thinking about. There may be an option to lever approx £50,000 from a long-term rental, but we're reluctant to so that unless there is good business case to do so. We generate around 4,400 kWh / yr from 4.2 kW of panels that are limited to 3.68 by the inverter. A 50kW array should give us around 50,000 kWh / yr.

What do people think? We don't use as much power as a large farming operation does so I've ignored local generation / use savings.]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289910#Comment_289910 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289910#Comment_289910 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 07:54:46 +0100 tony
I am a director of a community energy society and we still offer free solar panels to high daytime use customers, investors are getting over 5% interest historically - going forward a tad lower.

Batteries are flavour of the month but consume capital, energy and commissions, increase energy use, the opposite of what we as a nation need to be doing.

The market for energy selling will change dramatically over the medium term, virtual private wires will come in and better deals for selling

Check the model but I would go for it, shop around for installer and sale deals - forget batteries]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289911#Comment_289911 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289911#Comment_289911 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 08:38:42 +0100 Dominic Cooney Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289912#Comment_289912 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289912#Comment_289912 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 11:09:10 +0100 philedge Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289914#Comment_289914 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289914#Comment_289914 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 14:09:55 +0100 revor Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289917#Comment_289917 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289917#Comment_289917 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 15:43:00 +0100 Mike1
Seems like there's been some work on this in the USA, at least:
https://www.greenbiz.com/article/dual-use-solar-farms-welcome-nature-back-land#
https://www.nrel.gov/news/features/2019/beneath-solar-panels-the-seeds-of-opportunity-sprout.html

I see that they've also come up with the term 'Agrivoltaics'...]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289920#Comment_289920 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289920#Comment_289920 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 19:23:21 +0100 revor Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289921#Comment_289921 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289921#Comment_289921 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 21:15:52 +0100 Peter_in_Hungary Posted By: Mike1but imagine it would be worth combining it with a low-carbon agricultural use for the land beneath - which may mean installing the panels high enough to walk / work under, rather than at ground level.
Posted By: revorHere in Wales from what I can make out only G3 land is generally used for large scale PV and they are mounted high enough for sheep to graze under, it also makes it easier for maintenance work.

I am wondering how much use the land under the PV would be as it will be in a rain shadow with the bottom edge (of the PV) being subject to erosion. I can't imagine much of any value growing under a row of PV.

Over here PV farms are planted on very low grade land, locally max. 10cm of marginal (if any) topsoil then limestone.]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289923#Comment_289923 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289923#Comment_289923 Sun, 06 Jun 2021 21:22:21 +0100 Mike1 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=16952&page=1#Item_16]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289924#Comment_289924 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289924#Comment_289924 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 10:58:07 +0100 revor Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289930#Comment_289930 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289930#Comment_289930 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 12:57:59 +0100 Jamster

Thanks for your other points - revor, I know you specified your own battery / pv setup so I'll read up separately with your previous posts on that. Tony, thanks for your viewpoint also - do you have a price per watt type cut off point at which your CES buys panels? I'm conscious that the panel market is volatile so a representative cost for panels is going to be important for cost forecasts.]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289932#Comment_289932 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289932#Comment_289932 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 13:05:23 +0100 revor Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289933#Comment_289933 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289933#Comment_289933 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 13:59:04 +0100 Jamster Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289935#Comment_289935 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289935#Comment_289935 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 16:10:55 +0100 revor Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289940#Comment_289940 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289940#Comment_289940 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 19:41:46 +0100 jms452
With commercial redline breed they won't fly more than about 4' without good reason.

They will dust bathe so might mean you need to wash the PV more.]]> Investment in PV http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289942#Comment_289942 http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/newforum/comments.php?DiscussionID=17083&Focus=289942#Comment_289942 Mon, 07 Jun 2021 20:28:23 +0100 tony
Field scale should be below 800 per kWp but there can be other cost like connection cable run , transformers - I would be looking for lower than that for a big system]]>