SCX358G, many thanks for creating such a detailed report on your electrical installation, all of which I found very interesting. There is little to no chance of payback for me, and it seems unlikely this house will be passed on to any family members... I do like the idea of solar as I have a reasonable area of south facing roofing, more than enough room and access for all the hardware, between the house and garage. I think Tesla may provide a variety of packages that can also be tied into their cars charging, though I do not know whether the car`s battery can/could be used as backup to supply the house in times of power outage, could be handy if living in remote locations where power outage can be an issue, as it once was for me..
I would suggest that unless there is some sort of designed-in obsolescence, that an inverter should last forever, and that such is the search for ever improved battery performance that it seems Tesla expect their car battery`s to last for a decade, and given the charge discharge and loading they may experience, I suspect household loadings could provide battery`s with a much less stressful life thus extending their serviceability considerably..?
Of course it is natural that from the largest businesses to one band contractors are out to make a profit, at least on the installation side of things there are regulations providing..err..guidelines but..?? Luck will ever play it`s part..?
Governments should be involved in ensuring manufacturing industry design is such that designed-in obsolescence as a process is outlawed, especially in the solar energy and other green related processes, given there will be a huge demand for decades to go green, thus more than enough business generated to provide reasonable profits well into the future...
JohnH, could not agree more re the benefits of insulation. I through a process of self building doubled the size of my 50`s brick built house. Such were the building regs at the time that wood frame with an outer skin of blockwork was the way to go, and of course insulation had to fill the voids in the framing of external walls... I took that further and insulated between each of the rooms, in that I also fitted underfloor heating, the pipes of which were mounted onto a bed of insulation all of which was covered with a self levelling screed on which either tile or wood was used as floor covering... each of the rooms has it`s own thermostat controlling valves on a manifold... I expected the costs of energy consumption of the now enlarged home to increase considerably, more so in that I had added a sun room with seven large windows...though when the cost was much less than I imagined, I set to insulating the original part of the house using dot and dab process to mount insulation backed plaster plates to insulate all the internal walls that had external facing elements, and upped the thickness of the loft insulation to match that in the new build... As I was re-tiling the roof, I also built-in attic space ventilation by way of tile vents and a vented ridge to hopefully avoid condensation and rotting timbers etc.
Yeah a great pity that a few years back the government seemed to suggest that grants to help the populace to insulate their homes was perhaps just green cr*p...?
