What a dreadful month indeed! We didn't even manage to generate as much as March *sigh*. But every time I look at our array I think to myself about how much fossil fuels it's stopped us consuming over the course of the year. Currently 3MW and counting this year. These things have to be taken in perspective!
It amazed me how little our 2 air con units are currently using to keep the few rooms we have them in at a constant temperature, I just leave them running 24/7 now, we used 43 kwh between them for the entire of September, and the rooms were easily the most comfortable in the entire house. Definitely planning to expand them into other rooms and move towards ditching off the boiler completely next year. And yes September was dreadful for generation, we're about 40 kwh down on the estimate, which until this month has proved to be quite conservative
Thanks Tim, dont worry about your September production, the cloud that made my August production so poor just moved south :) So central Scotland 5.1Kwp south facing this year produced 425 kWh compared to last September at 479kWh so down about 50kWh . Best day was 4th and 18th both at 29kWh. Worst was a pathetic 1.3kWh on the 2nd, and two others at 1.4kWh a sign of things to come. Oh and the gas heating been on here for about 2 weeks now.
Days are getting longer here in Adelaide, South Australia. September is the first month of Spring. Generated 457kwh from the north facing 6.3kw house system and generated 732kwh from the 6.5kw east/west shed system. Total generation is 1.1 mwh from both systems.
You managed 54kwh of generation per kwp of panels. Ive got a 10.44kwp array and i managed 570kwh for the month so 54kwh of generation per kwp of panels. Just a really poor month, although this is my first year of solar so hopefully ive got a fantastic summer to look forwars to next year
626kwh down from 801khw in Essex Still £41 profit in with eon drive and will stay with it such a good tarif at 16.5p export and 0.065 night rate plus got 2 referral
Good video . This has been the worse September for us since we had panels installed in 2018 with generation down by 25%, so I do not think you have a system issue it is just the weather. Still using octopus go and it seems to be the best.
We were on IF until end Sept. 6.4kW system, south facing generation 530kWh, usage 379kWh. Just switched to F. In the extension to the house we have electric under floor heating might try running this on cheap (?) rate. Never used the UF heating before. Free logs always seems a cheaper option
My 377 kWh was the worst September since installed 5 years ago (4.8 kWp through a 3.6 kWh inverter with 2 Powerwalls on a steep South facing roof in Devon)
Production 576.64 kWhs Export 297.06 kWhs. Production down 80 kWhs compared with last September. Highest production day 17th 39.1 kWhs lowest production day 5th 3.96 kWhs. Still on Octopus Flux but will be changing in the next couple of weeks. Bill from Octopus £50.97 credit. Now have a credit of £574 built up for the winter months (been paying £1 on direct debit since 1st March 2024).
Nice. Yeah, it's good to see that credit build up over the Summer. I'm glad I'm not the only one to have a poor September, let's hope things don't continue to be bad through the Winter.
Thanks for the update. I’ve had fairly similar generation to your system month on month which was also true for Sept (406 kWh from west facing 5.8 kWp system on south coast). My first year so no previous Sept to compare to but down on the predicted Sept generation value for the first time compared to previous months. I’m wondering if I’ll start to suffer more now with a west-only array as the days shorten.
I have a similar strategy except I’m still not using the battery for consumtion (maybe I should). Anyway, running the heating at off peak rate. I have a blocker from 7-10 and 16-21 for heating. This way some of the peak solar can be used for heating mid day. Bridging the gap between the nights heating sessions. We’ll see how it goes.😊
As it gets colder you might need to extend the heating period a bit but you never know you might make it a good way through the Winter doing what you're doing.
We've had three Septembers now, our Solar Edge stats tend to read a little higher than bills state but relatively figures probably consistant. 615kWh in 2022, 641kWh in 2023 and only 553kWh in 2024 - so yeah Sept 24 has been poor. In fact on our system most months in 2023 beat 2024 (Jan and Apr are the exceptions so far) - we've seen a couple of individual days with similar max generation so fairly happy the system is running OK. System installed in mid July 2022 but Aug to Dec months beat 2023 every month except September so 2024 looks like it will be poor overall. We put in an air source heat pump at the same time as the panels with a Tesla Powerwall 2 following in October. Heatpump stats say we used approx 4600 kWh for hot water and heating in 2023 from the 8700kWh used in total. We generated approx 6500kWh in 2023 - we were on a Tesla 23p import, 23p export so over all electric costs for evertything were roughly HALF as just the oil costs in 2021. 2024 we've been on Octopus Flux - looks like annual costs will be similar, possibly slightly lower as most of our import has been to fill the battery at 16p kWh. Conclusion - if you're on an oil boiler - heat pumps look pretty special! Heat pump does look scary when its very cold (below 0C and really scary below -5C!!) but I suspect that's because we could not see the daily oil consumption...
Sounds like your combined system is working really well for you, that's fantastic to hear. I've found that combo of PV, battery, and heat pump is really amazingly effective.
Pretty decent considering. I use the PVGIS online tool to get a reasonable estimate of what to expect in lieu of historical data. Worth a look if you're interested.
Thanks again for the interesting info. I like your idea of pre-heating the house at the lower rate, I was thinking of doing this myself. I'm presently on Intelligent Flux which has been great for us during the summer due to the large amount of generation we can get but what tariff do you recommend for the winter - for those who do not have an EV? We are going to try Agile, with the AIO battery we have and small amount of generation we should be alright most day. We have a heat pump but Octopus told me that only those with a heat pump installed by Octopus can access the Cosy tariff.
I don't think Octopus are correct to say that you can't get the Cosy tariff if your heat pump isn't from Octopus, that sounds wrong to me. I expect if you pushed them they'd let you use it. However, Agile is probably a good bet, as long as you charge up your battery overnight, when it's typically cheapest.
My 7.56kWh E/W split gave me only 406.8kWh for September, down from the usual 500kWh, I have had for past 5 years. It has just been a bad month, but having said that a lot of this year has been lower for me.
620kWh from a 10kW east/west system. It's been a funny year. Some months up on 2023, some down. I'm still tweaking things to maximise my ROI. Still have to set export margin on my Eddi to avoid using solar for heating water rather than off-peak.
Just an idea, but in the monthly consumption stacked bar chart, could you move the yellow a2a region to the top of the stack? That might make it easier to compare the green/orange/blue layers that are currently above the yellow.
If we used our AC for dehumidification it would cool the house, which is not what we want during the Winter. A dedicated dehumidifier achieves what we want without cooling the house, so that's what we use.
287kWh from an 8kW East/West array, so you did better than us. Does your overall saving figure include not buying petrol for the car, or discount the extra electricity the car is using? If you've paid more for an EV than you would for an ICE car, it really complicates working out what is actually a saving, and whether you should count that saving against the cost of the car or the solar system.
Yes, the saving does include the difference between petrol and electric cost for the car. We're currently leasing so didn't buy the car. I agree it's complicated but EV prices are rapidly coming into alignment with the equivalent ICE cars so pretty soon that won't be an issue. I include that in the saving calculation because it's a whole system calculation: solar, battery, A2A, iHP, EV. They all work together so it's hard to disentangle them from each other where the savings are concerned. For example our savings are higher because we have the A2A as well as the solar; the solar savings without the A2A would be lower because we wouldn't be making such good use of our solar and battery system. Same argument goes for the EV.
No, it's a lot more tricky to include in my "rule of thumb" calculation, what with it being so variable, so I chose to leave it out. One day I'll figure out a good way to include it.
@@TimAndKatsGreenWalkThank you, it would be useful to have a way to compare it. Over the last few weeks with a few exceptions Agile has been expensive so you’d have to charge your batteries at up to 18p per kWh if there wasn’t enough sun but it is lower during the day on average and you could use the batteries in that 4-7pm period and during the whole evening when it’s been up to 42p recently. You probably know that already though. 😁
They all do dehumidification, however when running in "dry" mode you also get a load of cold air blowing around your house! It's basically just a lower power version of cooling, so no good for the Winter, sadly. You also can't run in heating mode and dry/cool mode at the same time, as they're essentially operating the heat pump in reverse directions. A dedicated dehumidifier has the benefit that it also warms the house a little while it's dehumidifying.
Technically, all of them do, as it's essentially AC mode, liquid condenses on the inner coil and gets drained outside. I'm surprised Tim needs dehumidifiers in the heating season though, as the inside hotter air has more capacity than the colder air outdoors. I typically have the opposite issue, where humidity levels inside get low, so I need a humidifier instead. Tim could, with sacrificing a bit of heat, use one (or more) inside units that aren't attached to the outside unit currently heating, in dry mode. It should be far more effective at dehumidifying than standalone units. (whether it uses less electricity or not I'm not sure, as there's pros and cons).
@@BenIsInSweden we could do that but with the cooling effect we'd then have to compensate by running the heating for longer, so overall power consumption would be higher. The standalone dehumidifiers are more effective and low power use anyway, as well as providing a little additional heating, so they work best for us in the Winter.
@@UpsideDownFork when we first got the A2A installed I did try the dry mode a couple of times but it was too cold! I went back to using the standalone dehumidifiers instead.
My September generation from a SolarEdge 4kw system shows 2024 as the worst year since 2015, 2020 was and excellent year (May 2020 my best ever) Sep-15 383318 Sep-16 345690 Sep-17 319744 Sep-18 367930 Sep-19 395973 Sep-20 438997 Sep-21 375452 Sep-22 336383 Sep-23 351197 Sep-24 301676
Typical my solar installed end of Sept 23, apparently great production till that week! So I’ve had worst solar period, can only get better i hope. Gotta say still delighted with system despite lower production. My electric only annual bill is now tiny, with EV & ASHP too.
What a dreadful month indeed! We didn't even manage to generate as much as March *sigh*. But every time I look at our array I think to myself about how much fossil fuels it's stopped us consuming over the course of the year. Currently 3MW and counting this year. These things have to be taken in perspective!
Yeah, as you say it's all good! We still covered our usage, so that's the main thing.
It amazed me how little our 2 air con units are currently using to keep the few rooms we have them in at a constant temperature, I just leave them running 24/7 now, we used 43 kwh between them for the entire of September, and the rooms were easily the most comfortable in the entire house. Definitely planning to expand them into other rooms and move towards ditching off the boiler completely next year.
And yes September was dreadful for generation, we're about 40 kwh down on the estimate, which until this month has proved to be quite conservative
Yeah, the A2A is very efficient at this time of year. It'll not be quite so good once it gets proper cold but still very efficient compared to gas.
I count my solar year from the end of September but yes, we are 1080kwh's down vs 2023. Truly a dreadful year for solar generation in Lincolnshire
Yup, not best, for sure. Still, there's always next year, which can't be much worse!
Thanks Tim, dont worry about your September production, the cloud that made my August production so poor just moved south :)
So central Scotland 5.1Kwp south facing this year produced 425 kWh compared to last September at 479kWh so down about 50kWh .
Best day was 4th and 18th both at 29kWh. Worst was a pathetic 1.3kWh on the 2nd, and two others at 1.4kWh a sign of things to come. Oh and the gas heating been on here for about 2 weeks now.
Yeah, looks like it's a pretty common story for this Sep. I had to double check my figures before recording the video, I was so shocked!
Intelligent Go is just such a beast of a tariff.
It really is. I just wish I could get it! Come on, Octopus, pull your finger (tentacle?) out!
441kWh from our 4kWh South facing panels and 2.7 kWh West facing panels - Derbyshire
Pretty decent!
1031kWh from 16.5kWp system in Glasgow. We had less rain in second half of month.
Crikey, nice system! I'm very envious.
September also 20% down on last year for me here in Bedfordshire (407 vs. 487 kWh)😢
I'm hearing this a lot today. Well, a couple of exceptions in Scotland, interestingly, but otherwise a very similar pattern.
Days are getting longer here in Adelaide, South Australia. September is the first month of Spring.
Generated 457kwh from the north facing 6.3kw house system and generated 732kwh from the 6.5kw east/west shed system.
Total generation is 1.1 mwh from both systems.
Roll on the Summer!
You managed 54kwh of generation per kwp of panels. Ive got a 10.44kwp array and i managed 570kwh for the month so 54kwh of generation per kwp of panels.
Just a really poor month, although this is my first year of solar so hopefully ive got a fantastic summer to look forwars to next year
Yeah, let's hope so! Just got to get through a miserable winter first.
626kwh down from 801khw in Essex
Still £41 profit in with eon drive and will stay with it such a good tarif at 16.5p export and 0.065 night rate plus got 2 referral
Nice! Well at least you're still in profit. It appears most folks have had a similarly bad September so let's hope things improve next year.
30% over the PVGIS estimate here on the West Coast of Scotland. 323kWH for a 3.2kWP south facing array. Weather here in September was brilliant!
Wow, that's great! Beating the rest of the UK by the sound if it. At least someone had a decent September!
Good video . This has been the worse September for us since we had panels installed in 2018 with generation down by 25%, so I do not think you have a system issue it is just the weather. Still using octopus go and it seems to be the best.
Yup, it's definitely looking like I'm not the only one, so that's a relief. Still, let's hope for better next year.
We were on IF until end Sept. 6.4kW system, south facing generation 530kWh, usage 379kWh. Just switched to F.
In the extension to the house we have electric under floor heating might try running this on cheap (?) rate. Never used the UF heating before. Free logs always seems a cheaper option
My 377 kWh was the worst September since installed 5 years ago (4.8 kWp through a 3.6 kWh inverter with 2 Powerwalls on a steep South facing roof in Devon)
I'm hearing this a lot in the comments now! I'm hoping next year will be better.
its not your panels, I see september down 21% on last year
Yes, it seems to be a common story, so at least it's not just me!
Generation was lower on Cambridgeshire September '24 compared to '23. 21% less.
Ok, good to know I'm not the only one.
This is my first year of having solar, but our 4.9kWp system generated 394kWh which was 99% of the PVGIS estimate. This is south facing in Manchester.
Ok, that's pretty good! It seems a lot of other folks had a poor September so you got quite lucky there.
Production 576.64 kWhs Export 297.06 kWhs. Production down 80 kWhs compared with last September. Highest production day 17th 39.1 kWhs lowest production day 5th 3.96 kWhs. Still on Octopus Flux but will be changing in the next couple of weeks. Bill from Octopus £50.97 credit. Now have a credit of £574 built up for the winter months (been paying £1 on direct debit since 1st March 2024).
Nice. Yeah, it's good to see that credit build up over the Summer. I'm glad I'm not the only one to have a poor September, let's hope things don't continue to be bad through the Winter.
Yep September solar poor, we’re 80% of forecast average. August 103% so not stunning but okay. Wet & cloudy! Even for NW England.
Sounds similar to a lot of others in the comments. Next year will (hopefully) be better!
632kWh from our 7.92kw system down the road in Somerset 🙂
That's not too shabby, really!
Thanks for the update. I’ve had fairly similar generation to your system month on month which was also true for Sept (406 kWh from west facing 5.8 kWp system on south coast). My first year so no previous Sept to compare to but down on the predicted Sept generation value for the first time compared to previous months. I’m wondering if I’ll start to suffer more now with a west-only array as the days shorten.
Yeah, it seems this is a common story for September, so at least I'm not the only one! Winter is always rubbish for us but at least it's something.
I have a similar strategy except I’m still not using the battery for consumtion (maybe I should). Anyway, running the heating at off peak rate. I have a blocker from 7-10 and 16-21 for heating. This way some of the peak solar can be used for heating mid day. Bridging the gap between the nights heating sessions. We’ll see how it goes.😊
As it gets colder you might need to extend the heating period a bit but you never know you might make it a good way through the Winter doing what you're doing.
@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk I get complaints if the hot water runs out so I’ll know when to tweak the system…:)
@@martinenstrom8206 haha! Of course.
Yep, appalling September. Panels are nice and clean from all the rain though!
Haha! That is a fair point.
My September was better than last year. This is in Glasgow as well so typically poor. I generated 672kWh during Sept ‘24 and 525kWh during Sept ‘23.
Very interesting. Local variations in weather, I guess.
We've had three Septembers now, our Solar Edge stats tend to read a little higher than bills state but relatively figures probably consistant. 615kWh in 2022, 641kWh in 2023 and only 553kWh in 2024 - so yeah Sept 24 has been poor.
In fact on our system most months in 2023 beat 2024 (Jan and Apr are the exceptions so far) - we've seen a couple of individual days with similar max generation so fairly happy the system is running OK.
System installed in mid July 2022 but Aug to Dec months beat 2023 every month except September so 2024 looks like it will be poor overall.
We put in an air source heat pump at the same time as the panels with a Tesla Powerwall 2 following in October. Heatpump stats say we used approx 4600 kWh for hot water and heating in 2023 from the 8700kWh used in total. We generated approx 6500kWh in 2023 - we were on a Tesla 23p import, 23p export so over all electric costs for evertything were roughly HALF as just the oil costs in 2021. 2024 we've been on Octopus Flux - looks like annual costs will be similar, possibly slightly lower as most of our import has been to fill the battery at 16p kWh.
Conclusion - if you're on an oil boiler - heat pumps look pretty special! Heat pump does look scary when its very cold (below 0C and really scary below -5C!!) but I suspect that's because we could not see the daily oil consumption...
Sounds like your combined system is working really well for you, that's fantastic to hear. I've found that combo of PV, battery, and heat pump is really amazingly effective.
421kw for sept 24 , on east 4kw and west 3.6kw setup with Givenergy battery, solar setup in Colchester, Essex
Slightly better than us for a slightly larger system. At least that's consistent!
A dire September for me, my worst yet, but having said that, of the 9 months so far this year, 7 have been my worst yet in 4 years of having solar!
Oh dear! At least I'm not the only one with a rubbish September. Let's hope for a better 2025.
6kw array south facing. First year so no historical data. 525kWh generated which was a lot worse than March. I’m located in East Northamptonshire.
Pretty decent considering. I use the PVGIS online tool to get a reasonable estimate of what to expect in lieu of historical data. Worth a look if you're interested.
September 2024 PV production was 20% down from last year in North London
A lot of other folks saying the same. Rubbish weather.
211 -> 168, so down by ~20% from last year.
Similar to a lot of other folks, it looks like. At least I'm not the only one!
Thanks again for the interesting info. I like your idea of pre-heating the house at the lower rate, I was thinking of doing this myself. I'm presently on Intelligent Flux which has been great for us during the summer due to the large amount of generation we can get but what tariff do you recommend for the winter - for those who do not have an EV? We are going to try Agile, with the AIO battery we have and small amount of generation we should be alright most day. We have a heat pump but Octopus told me that only those with a heat pump installed by Octopus can access the Cosy tariff.
I don't think Octopus are correct to say that you can't get the Cosy tariff if your heat pump isn't from Octopus, that sounds wrong to me. I expect if you pushed them they'd let you use it. However, Agile is probably a good bet, as long as you charge up your battery overnight, when it's typically cheapest.
My 7.56kWh E/W split gave me only 406.8kWh for September, down from the usual 500kWh, I have had for past 5 years. It has just been a bad month, but having said that a lot of this year has been lower for me.
Quite a common story, from what I'm hearing. Let's hope for a better 2025!
620kWh from a 10kW east/west system. It's been a funny year. Some months up on 2023, some down.
I'm still tweaking things to maximise my ROI. Still have to set export margin on my Eddi to avoid using solar for heating water rather than off-peak.
384kWh for me Tim, very similar...Think this year will be less than 4MW so not good as system was forecast to do 4.2MW.
Hopefully next year will be better. There will inevitably be some variation from year to year, so it should all even out in the long run.
Similar size East West array in the North West - last September 442kWh this year 377kWh this September. My figures always pretty much match yours.
Well, I am reassured by that, at least!
Just an idea, but in the monthly consumption stacked bar chart, could you move the yellow a2a region to the top of the stack? That might make it easier to compare the green/orange/blue layers that are currently above the yellow.
Possibly, it might require some shuffling of the data but should be doable.
Have you used your AC for dehumidification? What were the running costs compared?
If we used our AC for dehumidification it would cool the house, which is not what we want during the Winter. A dedicated dehumidifier achieves what we want without cooling the house, so that's what we use.
287kWh from an 8kW East/West array, so you did better than us.
Does your overall saving figure include not buying petrol for the car, or discount the extra electricity the car is using? If you've paid more for an EV than you would for an ICE car, it really complicates working out what is actually a saving, and whether you should count that saving against the cost of the car or the solar system.
Yes, the saving does include the difference between petrol and electric cost for the car. We're currently leasing so didn't buy the car. I agree it's complicated but EV prices are rapidly coming into alignment with the equivalent ICE cars so pretty soon that won't be an issue. I include that in the saving calculation because it's a whole system calculation: solar, battery, A2A, iHP, EV. They all work together so it's hard to disentangle them from each other where the savings are concerned. For example our savings are higher because we have the A2A as well as the solar; the solar savings without the A2A would be lower because we wouldn't be making such good use of our solar and battery system. Same argument goes for the EV.
@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk That's a good name, I'll call it the 'disentanglement problem' now.
@@robinbennett5994 haha! Yup, sounds good to me.
It's probably all my fault. I cleaned my panels at the start of September. It was just tempting fate.
Oh no! The irony being that all the rain then cleaned everyone else's panels!
worst September in 9yrs of having PV
Crikey. Let's hope we don't get many more of those.
Can’t help with the man made clouds, mine was well below expected
At least it wasn't just me then!
What about Agile, no price comparison for that one?
Very hard to approximate - because usage patterns would massively change
No, it's a lot more tricky to include in my "rule of thumb" calculation, what with it being so variable, so I chose to leave it out. One day I'll figure out a good way to include it.
@@TimAndKatsGreenWalkThank you, it would be useful to have a way to compare it. Over the last few weeks with a few exceptions Agile has been expensive so you’d have to charge your batteries at up to 18p per kWh if there wasn’t enough sun but it is lower during the day on average and you could use the batteries in that 4-7pm period and during the whole evening when it’s been up to 42p recently. You probably know that already though. 😁
Agile is a poor tariff if you want savings.
Do you know if there are any A2A systems with dehumidification built in?
They all do dehumidification, however when running in "dry" mode you also get a load of cold air blowing around your house! It's basically just a lower power version of cooling, so no good for the Winter, sadly. You also can't run in heating mode and dry/cool mode at the same time, as they're essentially operating the heat pump in reverse directions. A dedicated dehumidifier has the benefit that it also warms the house a little while it's dehumidifying.
@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk Ah, got it! I knew you'd have a very good reason for doing things the way you do.
Technically, all of them do, as it's essentially AC mode, liquid condenses on the inner coil and gets drained outside. I'm surprised Tim needs dehumidifiers in the heating season though, as the inside hotter air has more capacity than the colder air outdoors. I typically have the opposite issue, where humidity levels inside get low, so I need a humidifier instead.
Tim could, with sacrificing a bit of heat, use one (or more) inside units that aren't attached to the outside unit currently heating, in dry mode. It should be far more effective at dehumidifying than standalone units. (whether it uses less electricity or not I'm not sure, as there's pros and cons).
@@BenIsInSweden we could do that but with the cooling effect we'd then have to compensate by running the heating for longer, so overall power consumption would be higher. The standalone dehumidifiers are more effective and low power use anyway, as well as providing a little additional heating, so they work best for us in the Winter.
@@UpsideDownFork when we first got the A2A installed I did try the dry mode a couple of times but it was too cold! I went back to using the standalone dehumidifiers instead.
September was bad. Sept 23 = 412.9Kwh and Sept 24 = 345.32kwh
Very similar to a lot of other folks, by the looks of it. In some ways I'm relieved it's not just me. Let's hope next year is better.
350kwh from 4.5kw array this year, 440kwh last year, twas a poor month for sure
Oof, yeah, well below par. Looks like everyone was in a similar position from the comments I've been getting.
My September generation from a SolarEdge 4kw system shows 2024 as the worst year since 2015, 2020 was and excellent year (May 2020 my best ever)
Sep-15 383318
Sep-16 345690
Sep-17 319744
Sep-18 367930
Sep-19 395973
Sep-20 438997
Sep-21 375452
Sep-22 336383
Sep-23 351197
Sep-24 301676
Have you added an extra digit or two in those figures? Kw/h?
Yeah, wow, quite the outlier. I'm assuming those are Wh values.
@@bcpbrennan It's in watt hours rather than Kw/h. Divide by 1000
@@TimAndKatsGreenWalk Yeah not sure why SolarEdge export does that but yes it's Wh
Typical my solar installed end of Sept 23, apparently great production till that week! So I’ve had worst solar period, can only get better i hope. Gotta say still delighted with system despite lower production. My electric only annual bill is now tiny, with EV & ASHP too.
😎🌄🌅🌞🌥
Sounds about right.
Must be all that anthropomorphic climate change that they’ve convinced the plebeians is happening😅
Oh dear, I think you're watching the wrong channel. If you don't believe climate change is real you should stop watching my videos.