Every day more of us are getting the green message and putting it into practice in our homes. We’re making sure we recycle as much as we can, cutting back on waste and reducing energy consumption. Even so, a lot of people are still put off by the perceived costs involved in switching to a greener lifestyle. If that’s you, then you’ll want to know about the growing move towards microgeneration. It’s the posh name for domestic solar power, and not only does it make a serious contribution to the health of the environment, it can also give a long-term boost to both your bank balance and the value of your home.

The number of people choosing to install solar panels in their homes is increasing. Solar thermal collectors heat your water, photovoltaic panels take care of your other electrical needs, and they’re easy to install and unobtrusive. Producing 100% clean energy, the solar power is controlled and distributed around your home as easily as it would be with a standard electricity meter. Going solar reduces energy bills, insulates against future increases in costs by the energy suppliers and can increase the value of your home in the future.

Log on to our live Web TV Show with eco designer and presenter of ITV’s Dream Homes Oliver Heath and Helen Steed, Microgeneration Development Manager at npower who will explain in detail how microgeneration works, how it will benefit both you and the environment and how easy it is to install. Mainstream energy supplier npower has already equipped many UK homes with solar. Oliver and Helen will also talk about a new series of practical video guides on installing solar panels in your home as well as answering your questions live online, so be a bright spark and send yours in now.

Oliver Heath and Helen Steed, Microgeneration Development Manager at npower join us live online to discuss Microgeneration: Solar Power In Your Home

For more information visit www.npower.com/web/At_home/juice-clean_and_green/npower_solar/index.htm

For EcoCentric – Ethical & Eco Friendly Homewares & Gifts, webchats.tv recommends http://www.ecocentric.co.uk/index.html

I: Vicky Letch, host
O: Oliver Heath, presenter
H: Helen Steed, NPower

I: Hello and welcome to the Homes and Gardens Show, I’m Vicky Letch. Now every day more and more of us are getting the green message and putting it into practice in our homes. We’re making sure we recycle as much as we can, cutting back on waste and reducing energy consumption. Even so, a lot of people are still put off by the perceived costs involved in switching to a greener lifestyle. If that’s you, then you’ll want to know more about the growing move towards microgeneration. Now quite sure what that’s all about? Neither am I, don’t worry because in the next 20 minutes or so all will be revealed. I’m joined today by Microgeneration Development Manager – such a mouthful at NPower and that’s Helen Steed and television’s property guru – yes you heard, guru, Oliver Heath is also here. Welcome to both of you, thank you very much

O: Thank you

I: So Helen I’m going to start with you

H: Ok

I: I have to admit if we were at a – say a little soiree together – and I was being polite and I said so Helen, what do you do? You hit me with your title, I’d be stumped immediately! Tell us about microgeneration – what is it?

H: Probably need to work on the title I think! Blinding people with science. Microgeneration – it’s all about technology that you can install in your home that generates either electricity or power to heat hot water, so it’s something like solar panels on the roof of your house

I: Right

H: So I think the world’s heard of solar panels

I: Yes

H: But not necessarily the term microgeneration or photovoltaics, they’re sort of big long words that can blind people, but the gist is it’s solar panels you can install on your roof that get you a benefit either by generating electricity or heating your hot water

I: Ok. And you’re saying this quite casually, so I’m assuming it’s a relatively straightforward process. We’ll get into that in a moment

H: Ok

I: But obviously Oliver, the guru –

H: The guru

I: Sitting next to you

O: The guru

I: Now come on, the guru, and also a big fan of microgeneration – tell us why?

O: Well I think we need to look to the future and work out how our homes can serve us better, so in the way that I see it in the future we should be living in a more comfortable place that’s less draughty

I: Yes

O: So that we don’t spend so much money on energy bills and resource bills like water and electricity, and microrenewables are part of that, yes we’ve got to insulate our homes, our attics, our walls, our floors and make sure it’s all nice and warm and sealed in like it’s got a big jacket on, but also we should be thinking about the resources that are falling directly onto our houses. So we get rain, we can do rainwater harvesting, collect that water and use that. We’ve got sunlight that can be used to create electricity and hot water. So why are we paying these bills when you know, the energy’s there, we just need to pick it up and use it. And the technology is out there. The grant’s becoming more available. It’s all out there for us to make the most of. Most of the problem is about awareness and about the cost and understanding how to incorporate those technologies into our homes

I: Yes. And I would say it certainly is an awareness issue, because this is a new one for me. I had, hand on my heart, never heard the term microgeneration until several weeks ago when I knew I was going to be meeting you pair. Now you do say it’s a case of fitting solar panels onto the roof, so the process itself might be easy, but it’s going to be costly. Is that right?

H: It’s becoming more affordable

I: Right

H: I think that’s probably the sort of myth that people – oh that’s way too expensive, I won’t be able to afford to do that. But the prices are coming down, and there are grants available that help you know offset that initial cost

I: Ok. So once you’ve spent the money, I suppose what I’m getting at is how long will it take until we see that coming back in our bills – we want to save money as it were, so when do we see that saving kicking in?

H: Well it’s all about an investment, it’s a long term thing. It’s not a short term solution. So you’re looking at installing panels from as little as £5000 for the solar hot water panels, up to sort of, starting from £9000 for the solar photovoltaics that generate electricity. But all of those had the added benefits that they can save you on your energy bills, so for solar hot water, between 50-60% you can save on producing that hot water

I: Ok

H: So it’s all about a long term investment on reducing those bills

O: I think that’s important because on the whole we tend to think of short term

I: Yes, yes

O: We think oh it’s going to cost me this much to buy them and fit them, but actually in the future you know we’re making an investment in our home, and at the moment having our savings in banks isn’t doing very much, so investing this money in our home, it makes quite a lot of sense. Added to that, most people think that energy prices will go up

I: Yes

O: Yes? Plus government policy will always lead towards more sustainable technologies, so you’ll be future-proofing your house for future policies and guarding – safe-guarding the energy in your home. So it makes sense in lots of ways, not purely the immediate financial, but also the long term benefit of what’s going to happen to our houses and finances

I: Yes which is how we all need to start thinking obviously. Now that ties in with a question from propertyrenovate.com which is “are there any grants available on offer to homeowners wishing to go green by installing solar panels? What are the estimated cost of maintenance for an energy source which appears reliant on quite a fragile and expensive surface material?”

O: That’ll be Helen. Next question

H: That’ll be you then! The government has a grant program called the low-carbon buildings program. They offer grants available on all of microgeneration technologies, so if we go back to the solar photovoltaics again, that’s the maximum grant of up to £2500. They’re available now, ready, so people can have a look on the website and get some more information

I: Ok

H: So that’s really quite encouraging because they didn’t exist before, so they’re much more available

I: and all of this goes towards your energy rating certificates?

O: The energy performance certificate, yes -

H: On your home

I: yes

O: So when you – when you come to sell or even rent your house out, you have to get your home, you have to get an energy performance certificate, an EPC, and a surveyor comes out and asks you lots of questions and looks at the fabric of your home and how to insulate it

I: Yes

O: And so your home does become more desirable. The investment you make will boost it up the scale, so your home will then look more valuable, and also it reflects on a sense of your home being better maintained and looked after

I: Ok. Now your status as guru, means that you are not just thinker you are doer. And you’ve been working on a series of films, is this correct?

O: Yes that’s right

I: So tell us a bit about those?

O: Well I’ve been making a series of films with NPower that you can see on their website that help people understand the implications of microgeneration in their home. So in these films we’ve been looking at photovoltaics that create electricity, and solar water heating. So we’re looking at, you know, what’s the technology that needs to go onto our houses, i.e. the panels that go onto our roof

I: Yes

O: What needs to go into our houses, the boxes and the hot water tanks and all that kind of stuff. And then how does it affect people’s lives? And we also talk to some people who’ve had these things fitted, so we get a real sort of first-hand account of, you know, was it difficult to fit –

I: yes

O: And you know, what’s the reward, the payback, you know does it impact into your life? And generally what we’re seeing is that there isn’t very much impact, so it doesn’t need to impact on people’s lives. That the fitting time for photovoltaics is a day or two and then it just ticks away, it collects electricity, it gives you some, it sends some to the grid, you know it’s almost hassle-free really.

I: Yes

O: So the impact on people’s lives is minimal but they’re saving money by cutting down their electricity or hot water bill. Plus they’re giving some back and reducing their impact onto the environment. So the films are a really nice little sort of – encapsulated overview of the implications of getting involved with microgeneration

I: Ok. Well always good to hear it from the horse’s mouth, so let’s take a look –

Video Footage

“These are solar panels. But they’re not like the ones you may have seen before. These ones are special because they produce electricity, and they’re called photovoltaics panels. In this short film, I’m going to show you just how easy they are to fit. How they’ll cut your home’s electricity bill, how they’ll help to dramatically reduce your home’s carbon footprint.

A typical system will consist of a series of roof fixings. These are the coach bolts which fix down through the tile. A series of clips which fit on the bottom of those, and then rails which fasten on top of the clips.

Then you clip the panels onto the rails?

The panels are clipped onto the rails using a series of intermediate clips which will go with a lip, and a series of end clips which hold them onto the end

And this is all pretty strong – if it gets windy can the panels wobble around at all?

Once they’ve all been clipped together, and tightened down they’re solid. They won’t move at all.

Don’t be afraid of this amazing technology. Solar PV panels are simple to fit, cost effective and are changing our relationship with our power suppliers. How many people do you buy things from are showing you how to pay less for it and become a major contributor in reducing our carbon emissions? I’d say take a closer look – it’s well worth it.

I: Now I’ve got to say, it all looks very appealing. Excuse my ignorance, we do not live in southern Spain – it’s all a bit gloomy here. How does the whole solar power system work in our rain and clouds?

H: I think that’s one myth to be dispelled straight away. It doesn’t have to be bright Spanish sunshine for these solar panels to work, it just needs to be daylight

I: Oh darn it, I was hoping you were going to say Vicky, you have to move!

H: Yes – we’d have gone already! No it’s fine, it just has to be daylight. Certain parameters for the house as well, so south facing roof is ideal, the angle of the panel as well. Also no obstructions, so if you’ve got a huge great tree that’s shadowing the panel, that sort of thing all can affect it’s efficiency. So there are some key factors

I: Gosh there’s so many things that you wouldn’t necessarily think about

H: No

O: But the upshot of it is that you know, the conditions are great for using microgeneration systems in the UK. The technology is also there and it’s good enough, so you know we can do it. We don’t have to say it’s a technology of the future or tomorrow, it’s available right now

I: Now yes

H: And we do an online suitability questionnaire so that you know people can go through and say oh, is my house south facing and that sort of thing, so you can assess step-by-step whether your property is suitable

I: Oh that’s great, that’s really handy. We’ve got a question here from homebuilding.co.uk – “despite the benefits of using solar panels, some people find the look of them quite obtrusive. Are there ways of concealing solar panels or at least making them look less conspicuous, especially on older, period properties?”

O: Well aesthetics is an issue

I: Yes

O: And that sort of moves into the realm of planning and whether you know you can put photovoltaics or solar panels onto historic buildings or listed buildings. There are different types of panels, so you can get what’s called vacuated tubes

I: Right

O: Which is basically a series of long tubes that fit onto the roof. Or you get panels which are sort of rectangular, and they fit onto that, and they fit onto the roof. But you can also get what looks like slate tiles, and they’re dark and sort of dark graphity grey, and embedded within those are photovoltaic panels that can great energy

I: Wow

O: So there are ways of embedding photovoltaics into buildings. I mean the other way, with my architectural hat on is that you, if you were doing a new build, and you build a parapet which is a little upstanding wall in front of the roof and it hides the panels

I: I knew that!

H: Of course you did

O: Not everyone will

I: I didn’t really

O: Sorry as the guru you’ve got to just take it down a level! There are architectural ways that you can conceal them

I: Ok

O: But, and eventually the technology will become embedded into the materials that we’re using on architecture, but in the meantime we need to retro fit, which means we need to stick on boxes or tubes, or these tiles if you’re re-covering the whole roof

I: I think that’s really important to get that message across, because I imagine there’s quite a lot of people out there that would be concerned about the look of their home. You know, you’ve paid the money for this period property and you want it to look like a period property, so it’s good to know that there are options there

O: Yes. However, there’s no reason why you can’t turn your, wear your environmental credentials on your sleeve, turn your neighbours green with envy and display them with pride. I mean I know where I live in Brighton, whenever a house has solar water heating tubes or photovoltaic panels, it’s always referred to as oh, that’s the eco house or you know – it’s sort of in some respects, it’s a good flag to be flying

I: Absolutely, yes absolutely. By the way I liked your “green with envy” – I thought that was very clever! Barry Davidson, how are you? Thank you very much for your question. Barry says “how much value will I add to my house?” Oooh

O: Well that’s a difficult one and obviously it would depend on the architecture and the building and the state of the rest of the house, but Julian Brooks who is the managing director of Eco House – ECOS, he’s an eco estate agent, estimates that it would add 5% to the value of a home

I: Ok so worthwhile then?

O: Absolutely

I: Absolutely worthwhile

H: And you’d like to think if it was a choice between two similar properties in a road, that the one with the solar panels would be more attractive –

I: Absolutely

H: because you sell all the benefits of having solar on your house

I: Yes and with the awareness building, I should think it would be on the top of lots of people’s wish lists now, certainly. But Rachel says “are there problems with retrospectively fitting solar panels rather than including them in a new build, and does it cost a lot more?”

H: I think it goes back to Oliver’s point, it does depend on the building. We do both types, so retrofit and new builds, so I think roof construction, that sort of thing. But it’s relatively easy to do, we have an in-roof system where some tiles are removed and brackets are fitted and the panels go on top, or as we’ve discussed the integrated roof type, where tiles are removed. You can have them all flush in with your roof and then tiles put back, so it’s all completely seamless. But it does depend on the construction of the roof, the whole building in the first place, and what we said about listed buildings, and there are probably some planning issues, but it’s really easy

O: In the films we go into these fitters who work for a company called Eco First, and they talk about the fact that they, you know they fit them on all sort of roofs whether -

H: Different types

O: Whether they’re old slate roofs or quarry tile roofs or you know, all sorts of roofs, and they say there isn’t a problem. They say they basically drill through, they attach all the fittings and they attach the pipes or the panels, depending on what you’re having fitted. There isn’t a problem. So new build or retro fit – it’s all possible

H: All possible

I: It’s like going to the tailors, you have that bespoke experience

H: Absolutely

I: It’s not one size fits all, they make it work for your home and your property which is great. David Smith, thank you very much. David Smith says “hi Helen”

H: Hello! Hi David – he knew my name, that’s great!

I: “Obviously there are lots of types of renewable energy technologies being developed at the moment, I was wondering which renewable energy technology do you foresee being utilised more and more in the future, and which renewable technologies are NPower in particular focusing on? Thanks, David.” Can I have a signed auto –

H: No he doesn’t say that

I: No

H: Thanks David. That’s quite a hard question. I think for me it’s all about a mix of technologies. I don’t think we’re going to hang our hat on just the one. So we’ve got solar panels available now, but I think going forward it’s looking at what’s best for individual properties, so it could be, you know on off-gas areas that you might look at you know resources from the ground or air, or you know the local woodland area if you’re thinking about something like a biomass boiler in the future. All this technology is being developed, as we speak, becoming much more efficient, much more reliable, so I’d like to see a mix of solutions really, I don’t think we’re just sort of hanging our hat on the one. Solars are ready and available now so that’s the one that we’re obviously discussing, but I think it’s quite exciting to see the developments and the way things are going and what’s coming next, so yes we’ll be keeping a close eye on how all of that develops

I: Excellent. You want to watch out she might be stealing your guru’s cap –

O: I think she’s going to be an eco goddess isn’t she?

I: I’m watching – yes I’m seeing the power being moved here, in front of my very eyes!

H: It’s the vibe I think

I: Andy C, “how much can I sell the energy for back to the National Grid?”

H: That’s probably me again I guess isn’t it?

O: Sorry

H: Again it depends on area of the country, that people live, but if we use the photovoltaics for example it’s about 12p per kilowatt hour that you can sell it back to us for

I: Ok

H: So very comparable to what we sell it to our customers for in the first place, so that’s what we like to compare

O: But it is one of those facts that’s set to change so it’s very difficult to discuss things like –

H: Yes

O: Payback periods because payback tariffs are inevitably going to change and other countries in Europe have higher tariffs, and there’s a very good chance that England will be moving in that direction to encourage and stimulate the renewables market, so all these things are going to work in the favour of microgeneration, so in some respects you’re future-proofing your house and your finances by fitting them as soon as possible

I: Great. Now, believe it or not, all good things come to an end, and this is coming to an end. I’ve got time to squeeze in one more question – Gareth you’re a lucky man, here we go. Gareth Davies says “what is the single best energy-saving tip from within the home which I could do simply to lower my carbon footprint?” Who wants to tackle that one?

O: Well we should both have it actually –

I: Yes, team effort, lovely

O: The goddess and the guru –

H: Joint effort

O: Yes I mean probably the easiest physical thing is to go down to the shops, get some energy-saving light bulbs. Energy-saving bulbs can save you around £70 per bulb compared to a traditional bulb, over its life span, because it lasts for 10 times the amount, and also over that period will save you about, I don’t know a fifth of the energy, use a fifth of the energy, so you won’t have to change the light bulb as much and you’ll be saving money over that time period

I: Yes

O: So it’s probably the easiest. If you don’t like those energy-saving bulbs then you know get some nice lampshades, cover the bulbs over, they don’t get hot so you can cover them in all sorts of things. So it’s a kind of a creative solution but it’s an easy way of reducing your home’s carbon footprint

I: Great. Do you want to add anything?

H: I will, yes. For me it’s all about insulation. So that’s the first measure you should always do in your home before any of the other things we’ve discussed

I: Yes

H: So if you’ve got cavity walls, get them filled. Look in your loft, if it’s not topped up with insulation that’s another measure you should get done

O: You can get grants for those

H: You can get grants for those, so definitely go and have a look on our website for that, because we offer all sorts of different grants for those measures. So it’s definitely the time to go and do it

I: Brilliant. And I would just like to say before I say goodbye, Oliver the guru asked m earlier what I’m doing in my home and I said nothing, and I’m thrilled skinny to report energy-saving light bulbs, I forgot I have those!

O: Yeah!

I: Yeah!

H: Well there you go

I: I’m a good person. Right I’ve got to say goodbye, thank you so much for your time, it’s been really massively informative. Hopefully if you can, make moves towards finding out information that will work for your home, and how it will work for you. But if you want more information go to npower.com/solar, I’ll say goodbye and I’ll see you next time

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