Glow Green Solar panels

[Epictantrum]

Hi,
Was just about to go ahead with a quote for solar panels with this company when I thought "I'll just check Mumsnet for reviews" and came across this thread https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/property/3750700-Glow-Green-Ltd?page=2 from a couple of years ago which basically says they are a nightmare.
Has anyone had any more recent contact with them, specifically regarding solar panels? The information they have sent is really impressive and the salesman was very helpful, so fingers crossed.

We had solar panels fitted by them last year. Be aware that they don't have their own teams but basically use a panel of freelancers eho could be based anywhere and IME are pretty unreliable.

The fitting itself was a total nightmare. The panels and battery were delivered to our driveway a couple days before fitting was due to happen and then they cancelled the night before. Twice. I asked for reassurance that if the panels were stolen from our drive that they were insured by them. Apparently not. So we had to kind of block them in with our cars and my husband slept downstairs at the front of the house, just in case.

Then when they eventually sent a team (after I read them the riot act) they sent a pair of cowboys to attach the panels, who damaged our roof and we had a leak when it rained. Took days to get sorted and in the meantime our loft insulation was soaked and the newly decorated room below was damaged.

When the electrician finally turned up to connect everything, the panels had been wrongly fitted so all had to come off again and be refitted.

In fairness, we did get compensation when I withheld payment (I put a stop on our credit card) but that process was not straightforward and they made me feel like a liar.

OTOH they're probably no worse than most companies, as I think all the big national companies have the same model of using freelance teams. So unless you use a trusted local company then it's probably a risk regardless of who you go with. Price-wise, they were the lowest by some way and it's all been fine since, so if you're lucky then it should all be ok.

Thanks. Not a glowing review! It is really tricky to know what to do.

@Epictantrum did you find a good installer? I’m looking and there’s some real cowboys! Any recommendations?

@NotDonna I've just approached Octopus Energy - huge company likely to still be around in a decades time and https://www.projectsolaruk.com/

I'm specifically looking at monocrystalline panels - I get the impression that rather a lot of people only consider the cheaper polycrystalline panels (single inverter, series connection, shorter life, lower efficiency in low light levels that we see in the UK) - the polycrystalline panels are connected in parallel and have a small inverter for each panel and the system is easier to expand, i.e. add extra panels to.

Octopus Energy can install 440W DeepBlue 4.0 Pro PV solar panels (which are monocrystalline) and they come with a 25-year product warranty and a 30-year linear power output warranty but they are made by JA Solar in China.

I was trying to identify solar panels that were not manufactured in China and so far have identified:
LG Solar and Q Cells from S Korea,
REC Solar (Singapore and Norway)
Meyer Burger (Swiss/German)
and SunPower (USA - who I also might not want to deal with on principle)

I'm looking at a battery from GivEvergy or Tesla Power wall 2 (I am looking at others - LG Chem RESU, Enphase EnCharge, SonnenBatterie, PowerVault 3)

TBH I still think the break even point will be 11-15 years but my concern is that with Trump in America for the next ~3.5 years and the situation in Ukraine, that there could be considerable instability in energy prices so that makes it difficult to calculate a break even point... of course there are other good reasons to try and reduce dependency on fossil fuels.

hth

Ahh interesting @Epictantrum unfortunately Octopus can’t do ours as we have a slate roof. And project solar U.K. put me off with the whole push to rent the panels rather than purchase up front. They just seemed interested in pushing a finance package, rather than answer questions re batteries, EV charger etc which hugely put me off. So many dodgy outfits out there.

If you haven't done so already then sign up to the FB groups for any of the suppliers you are looking at. You'll get an idea of how reliable (or not) they may be.

Why not Tesla PW3? Why would you go with Tesla (USA) if may not go with Sun Power?

@XVGN It's not that PW3 isn't in the frame - it's obviously more advanced - it's just the additional cost which I think is about an extra £2k - not sure yet as I haven't got any full quotes yet - my annual usage is only 1800kWhrs so a low usage makes it hard enough to break even and I'm already pushing the price in the wrong direction with the monocrystalline panels. Part of the problem for me is that I have no south facing roof, no one is interested in mounting anything on my flat roof extension but I have a huge, but shallow angled west facing roof - it's not ideal.

Re:Tesla/USA - I am a Starlink user - and I'm concerned about anything Musk is involved with ATM - Starlink is fantastic in those situations where there's no mobile signal - which is more common that you might imagine - I use it on my campervan and in the past 2 months I've been away for over 5 weeks - Norfolk, Cambridge, Cotswold's, Lancashire - it ticks me off that they increased the price after years of suggesting prices would come down as uptake increased. How will Tesla do long term? I don't know. He's a rich guy but he's lost a lot of money - Q1 profits down 71%, share price down 40% since Dec 24, brand/reputation damage. Trump's tariffs are affecting Tesla's own supply chains.

I worked in several areas of the electrical power industry (generation, protection, distribution, metering) for many years - writing software for power stations, electricity meters, etc - and worked for 2 US companies - I'm not sure at all how working with US supplied kit is going to work out - frankly China seems like a more reliable long term business partner ATM (I worked on systems for the 3 Gorges Project and on power projects in India and South Korea). Experience teaches me to be wary of over specifying a system - e.g. buying flexibility or capacity that I really may not need.

The PW3 provides more storage capacity than I actually need - according to my calculations - but other factors, costs, benefits/break even may decide otherwise - my investments in the stock market are 8-18% down since Feb so going to sit tight on that for who knows how long - but I've got money sat in the bank - just numbers on a page - doing next to nothing - 3-4% - and interest rates are possibly heading downwards so I was just looking at putting the money to some use seeing as we might have decided not to move again in the foreseeable future.

I've looked at solar several times in the past and written it off as hard to justify - solar panel and battery prices - although lower - and unit prices for electricity although higher - still don't make it easy to justify imho - especially if you might want to put your money into other projects.

Thanks for the reply @slackademic .

I've been looking (for a few years!) myself. The PW3 capacity would allow me to run the home during power-cuts (we get a few) and potentially support a future electric-vehicle and/or export to the grid during peak hours. I'm quite interested in the virtual battery concept too, whereby my battery could be linked to others and managed centrally.

Are yo u subscribed to the Gary Does Solar YT channel. He has some good SS. on his Patreon.

@XVGN thanks for the YT link - I've not seen the channel before. I watched a few. I'm not persuaded by Gary that adding a solar system adds value to your property unless you sell within maybe less than 5 years of installing - in which case - why pay to install the system if they payback is 10+ years. I think there are a whole set of legitimate concerns a buyer might have - transferrable warrantee, integrity of the roof post-installation, support in the event of problems - actual financial benefit, expected life of components such as the converter, availability of parts - I'm also looking at an air source heat pump (which I'm not particularly keen on unless we go for underfloor heating - even more expense) partly because I am very sensitive to noise - I shall buy spares at the time I install anything if that's what it comes to. My wife has decided we should stay put - I'm not so conclusive TBH - maybe the total costs of solar, underfloor, ASHP, hot water tank, etc will making moving look more attractive - I have no particular attachment to the house or area for work or family reasons so I'm going through the motions until I have a set of figures and a proposal for everything we're looking at.