13Feb

Zoe and the big PV array

Posted by: In Photovoltaic

Our last PV installation was for a Renault Zoe. Her owners wanted electricity for their house, a smart immersion switch and to charge their new electric car. Our calculations showed that a regular 4kWp array just couldn’t do all of the above and we wanted Zoe to have a big share of the available energy so we suggested a larger, 5.7kWp array that could do just that. Their large roof could accommodate 20 of JA Solar’s efficient 285W panels and we thought they’d look great on the dark grey roof tiles.

Zoe has a 22kWh battery and the 5.7kW array could supply daily averages of 4kWh in the winter, 19kWh in the spring/autumn and 25kWh in the summer. Depending how far she’s driven, that should keep Zoe feeling zippy and still have enough left over to power the house for a decent chunk of the year.

We started talking to Zoe’s owners in September last year as the only down side of a big PV array is that you have to ask the Distribution Network Operator (the folk who manage the grid) permission in advance. They were happy for us to go ahead once we’d made a formal G59 application but it took eight weeks for them to consider it. That made our installation a chilly start to the year for us but an unusually sunny day recently (12th Feb) generated 21kWh which was a nice top up for Zoe.