IKEA UK Now Selling Solar Panels for Homes

[JMcEntegart]

Fingers crossed for sunshine.

IKEA UK Now Selling Solar Panels for Homes : Read more

 

[virtualban]

In a few years, these jewels will have paid for themselves.

But look at a more positive example... imagine a zombie apocalypse. At least, a few hours a day you can still charge your Android even if everything else fails (assuming iPeople will not be among the surviving crowd).

 

[outlw6669]

I am not sure as to price comparisons, but 5700 GBP for a complete system that should be easily able to power an average home (on a sunny day) does not seem like that bad of a deal.

 

[boju]

I seen a documentary a couple years ago, someone might recall, research using sort of solar film that could be used as a layer on an entire roof surface. Was quite interesting, don't remember how effective it was or even heard more of it since.

It was awhile a go seeing it and one thing that stuck in my mind was their comment about how significantly cheaper it was a meter compared to solar panels.

 

[house70]

In a few years, these jewels will have paid for themselves.

But look at a more positive example... imagine a zombie apocalypse. At least, a few hours a day you can still charge your Android even if everything else fails (assuming iPeople will not be among the surviving crowd).

Are you kidding? The iZombies can already be seen lining up at Apple stores. LOL

If IKEA makes the while process headache-free, kudos to them. I think a tiered-style service would be better (full service for customers that can afford full price, skip the energy monitoring service for the next tier down, and so on).

 

[CaedenV]

Average electric use in the US (according to eia's website) is 940kWh/mo. If you live in a zone 5 area like I do then that means you need a ~9kWh system to cover all electrical needs. At ~$9,000 USD for a 3.3kWh system it would mean roughly $25,000 for a full grid-tie system. Not a terrible price to be sure, and hopefully you could get a better deal on a larger system as there would be less redundancy of parts and labor that are built into that price, but still a little out of reach for those of us who would get very little in the way of tax breaks.

The other issue is that the 940kWh/mo is based upon actuial usage, not total energy needs. In other words, most people out my way run their heater, hot water heater, and stoves on natural gas rather than electricity... which means that you are still forking over a bit of cash to Duke or GE during those winter months unless you have the money to convert those appliances on top of the solar costs. I would love to go solar eventually, but it is going to be a loooong time before it will a financially viable option.

 

[Au_equus]

the solar panels are the result of an agreement between ikea and hanergy (of china). they use cadmium telluride (CdTe) thin film technology.

 

[w8gaming]

Average electric use in the US (according to eia's website) is 940kWh/mo. If you live in a zone 5 area like I do then that means you need a ~9kWh system to cover all electrical needs. At ~$9,000 USD for a 3.3kWh system it would mean roughly $25,000 for a full grid-tie system. Not a terrible price to be sure, and hopefully you could get a better deal on a larger system as there would be less redundancy of parts and labor that are built into that price, but still a little out of reach for those of us who would get very little in the way of tax breaks.

The other issue is that the 940kWh/mo is based upon actuial usage, not total energy needs. In other words, most people out my way run their heater, hot water heater, and stoves on natural gas rather than electricity... which means that you are still forking over a bit of cash to Duke or GE during those winter months unless you have the money to convert those appliances on top of the solar costs. I would love to go solar eventually, but it is going to be a loooong time before it will a financially viable option.

Yes, solar is still expensive and unless one uses very little electricity compared to most modern home needs, the cost breakeven point is usually more than 10 years. But as oil prices will continue to go up and as a result drives up electricity bill, solar might one day ends up becoming the cheaper option.

 

[digiex]

If you have a 24/7 seed box, solar power is a must.

 

[zakaron]

This could be particularly useful if you own a plug-in electric car. It doesn't say what voltage the 3.3KWh is delivered at (assuming 230V for UK market), but based on gasoline prices in the US, it could pay for itself in about 50,700 miles of driving (I assumed $3.55/gal gas, 20mpg average). If you powered other circuits from this to the house, like A/C, it could pay for itself even quicker.

 

[tniedoba]

Just curious how much maintenance would be expected on such installations over their lifetime, and what is the life expectancy since the panels have to endure all types of weather. I would think the costs will be higher than initially expected, kinda like a new car, maintenance is inevitable. It must use batteries for storage too, and like most batteries I've had to deal with, they degrade faster than I'd like them to and are not cheap to replace... What if after a few years, the whole thing needs to be replaced again... hope the warranties cover a good length of time and are not purely for defects.

 

[tniedoba]

How much maintenance is typically required in the lifetime of such installations, and what is the life expectancy since the panels have to endure all types of weather. Do these things not break? I would think the costs will be higher than initially expected, kinda like a new car, maintenance is inevitable. It must use batteries for storage too, and like most batteries I've had to deal with, they degrade faster than we'd like to, and are not cheap to replace...