Boost your solar panel savings by £60 a year

Household money

Updated on 23 March 2012 | 11 Comments

A new product is designed to increase the effectiveness of home solar panels to reduce your energy bills by another £60 per year.

Considering all the companies that promise to save us money, it's a wonder that we don't end up with more money than we started with. One company is now plugging a way to boost the effectiveness of the solar panels on our roofs. Let's see how much it can help us cut our gas and electricity bills.

Increase the savings from your solar panels

Solar24 is a product from a company called engensa, which has dispensed with the opening capital letter in its logo, which tells us it's a new-tech company with brilliant ideas, a bit like lovemoney.com!

Solar24 automatically diverts excess energy produced by your panels to your immersion heater for later use, cutting the cost of heating your water with gas by around 10%.

You will now use almost all of the energy from your solar panels, which might be double what you were using before. engensa estimates the technology will create additional savings of £50 to £60 per year. These savings will rise with energy prices and you should expect to save more if you use oil or electricity for water heating.

The feed-in tariff for generating power will still be paid, whether it is you or your installer who benefits from it. However, if you paid for the panels instead of getting free ones, and you're taking the benefits of the feed-in tariff yourself, you'll get a little less from Solar24, because you are no longer getting an extra payment for exporting energy to the grid. However, the device should still be worth it in the long run.

Solar24 is free if you install it with the solar panels. Otherwise, it'll cost at least £250. Still, at that price you could make your money back inside five years and start profiting afterwards.

What do we know about engensa?

The energy saving trust has previously warned about rogue solar panel traders – and I note the trust also excludes capital letters from its logo.

Independent renewable energy website YouGen – which uses capitals but we shall forgive them for it – warned recently about “cowboy” solar panel traders, too.

However, engensa is one of the good guys. I've looked into engensa's background and it seems to be capable, serious, and honestly run, offering free solar panels, paid-for solar panels, and the Solar24 technology.

More importantly, the feedback from engensa customers on the YouGen website is outstanding, just like its major competitors. If you want to find top suppliers in your area, you can use YouGen's search tool.

engensa's sales pitch is worth reading, since it designs systems for all sorts of roofs and aesthetic requirements.

Avoiding the cowboys and rogues

Apart from searching YouGen, there are other ways to avoid the bad guys. YouGen has drawn up a check list. The main points in short are:

  • Check the installer is accredited under the Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS).
  • Establish how long they've been in the business and whether they're going to subcontract the work out. If they do, check who will take overall responsibility.
  • Ask whether the system they recommend is sized specifically for your roof.
  • Be suspicious if they don't estimate how much power it will generate for you.
  • Get at least three detailed written quotations. (Some people get as many as six.)
  • Ask your installer for local case studies or to speak to previous customers.
  • Never sign up on the day. Be wary of any salespeople who ask you to, especially if they offer discounts that depend on it. This is against the MCS installers' code of conduct.
  • If you're installing more than one technology, check that each installer understands the other technology and how they work together. Check whether they have done a similar installation before, and ask for references.
  • Once your system is installed ask your installer to show you how to use it and how it works with your existing plumbing or heating.
  • Check the warranties provided by the installer. “This is another area where poor installers fudge their answers,” says YouGen. Most installers offer a 10-year warranty and a 10-year insurance-backed warranty.

More: compare gas and electricity prices | Government wants to keep cutting solar feed-in tariffs | Free solar panels: The small print exposed

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