Solar PV, Batteries and Heat Pumps -Which to install first?
The holy trinity of renewable energy.. but which should come first?
Regardless of which technology you are going to install first, the first consideration before installing anything should always be to ensure your home is fully insulated. This minimises the amount of heat loss and keeps your system as energy efficient as possible.
Secondly, moving to renewable energy means that you should look for an energy tariff that is designed for renewable technology. Most tariffs offer peak and non peak rates meaning that you can adjust your energy usage within these windows to increase your cost efficiency.
A Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) is an excellent investment to a property looking to manage energy prices and consumption. Using an Energy Management System, a home owner can identify where energy usage is high and shift demand to reduce energy costs, or use the battery to store energy bought at the cheaper rate to counter the peak period.
Running a washing machine during an off peak period will cost less than using it in a peak period. Running a washing machine during a peak period, but using the energy stored in the battery, means the home owners is still paying the lower energy rate during peak costs.
Additional technologies, such as PV panels, can easily be integrated with the battery at a later date.
There is currently 0% Vat on battery energy storage systems until March 2027. Visit our battery storage systems page by clicking on the link.
Generating energy from the sun and using that energy to run either your home or to charge the battery is an excellent way to reduce your home energy bills. Solar PV can generate year round, although obviously does better in sunny weather. There is currently 0% Vat on Solar PV until March 2027 meaning homeowners can currently save on both materials and installation when using an MCS approved installer. We work with Solarwatt as our preferred partner for installing Solar that integrates with our heat pump and battery storage system installations.
Working year round to provide hot water and heating to a home, a heat pump is a big change to a property energy usage. Moving away from fossil fuels and using renewable energy to heat properties is the future for many of us and the government are offering grants of up to £7,500 towards the installation of heat pumps. Find out more about our installations here
Which one first?
There is no perfect answer… the important thing is to understand that renewable technologies are the future and the sooner we can start investing in them, the better.
There are a number of factors to take into consideration for each home owner such as the age of the boiler in the property and whether replacing it with a heat pump makes sense. It may be that the boiler has a reasonable life span left on it, and money is best invested in a different technology at this time or it may be that the home cannot be insulated well enough to make a heat pump the right choice.
Deciding whether battery storage makes sense for the energy usage of the property. If a homeowner does not use much energy, and would not benefit from storing energy during off peak times, then an investment into battery might not be right for that home owner.
Solar PV is a good investment if you plan to be in the property long enough for the savings to cover the outlay cost, it also depends if you plan to alter the roof space and the direction the solar panels could be installed. Installing north facing will result in less generated energy which might mean it takes longer to cover the cost and start to make savings. Installations of SOLARWATT integrate well with our STIEBEL ELTRON heat pumps.
Each home should be considered as a bespoke project and it would be worth a conversation about your property and your future plans before committing to installing one type of renewable technology over another.
PBT Installations can help with this process, please contact us to discuss your projects.
