RTS - How solar works for you - Manual / Resource - Page 4
Take control of your home’s energy costs. An introduction to solar PV
Savings and tariffs
A solar panel installation produces two sources of financial gain:
Consumption - A reduction in expensive electricity taken from the grid, and thus a saving in electricity
bills. Every unit of energy you generate and use, is one less that needs to be bought. The savings
depends on the tariff paid to the electricity provider, but as residential rates are typically over 24p per
kWh and rising, the savings pot can build up quickly.
Many households will not use all the solar electricity they produce in the daytime, particularly through
the summer months, so a well-designed battery storage addition to the solar PV allows you to store
this unused electricity until its needed, for instance at nighttime – maximizing your self-consumption
and savings.
Export – There may be occasions when you produce so much electricity that even the battery is full,
and whilst there are options to divert this to other areas (for instance to heat your hot water tank or
part of your Smart Home set-up) you can also be paid for the electricity you feed back to the grid.
Tariff rates vary, but a typical rate from Octopus in the summer of 2024 is around 15p per kWh. All our
projects are installed and registered under the Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) to
ensure electricity companies must pay you for the power you give them.
