Fitting the solar electric panels on the roof

One of the most visible changes over the last fortnight has been the installation of our solar photovoltaic (PV) panels on the roof, which will give us plenty of renewable electricity. There’s no way we can hide the panels or beautify them, sadly; they’ve got to be fully exposed to work properly.

They’re mounted on the roof of the top box, so they’re hidden as much as can be by a low parapet.

We can camouflage their control box behind the chimney, but perhaps I missed a trick by not including this element as part of my green roof. The planting might have helped mask them a bit – wildflowers and PV panels make happy bedfellows, perhaps counter-intuitively.

At any rate it’s a relief to get the panels out of the garden, where they’ve been sitting since they arrived (we bought them early to take advantage of the higher Feed-In Tariff that was only available before spring 2012).

The other tariff we hope to take advantage of is for the wood pellet boiler. My company is based in the house and rents its office from us, on which it will pay small business rates. Our local suppliers, Navitas, tell us we are eligible to receive the commercial Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), as the boiler will heat the office.

We still haven’t got nearly close enough to finishing our new home to luxuriate in interesting decisions. Our concerns are much more prosaic. How are we going to dry the basement out? We must remind the builders to clear out the cold bridges in the walls and not use the dreaded expanding foam around the window frames. Also, where are we going to store the kitchen units when they arrive in a fortnight? Who knows!