Here is my monthly report on how our solar panel system did in September 2026. We have:
- 20x400W panels = 8kW, facing west
- 5kW GivEnergy inverter
- 9.5kWh GivEnergy battery
The house is in the UK at about 52° north. The system was installed in February 2024 by Octopus who also supply our power and gas.
This is the year so far, all in kWh:
| Month | Generated | Used | Exported | Imported | Cost import | Paid export | Axle |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 110 | 518 | 106 | 522 | £88.53 | £14.91 | £0 |
| February | 237 | 592 | 226 | 580 | £79.08 | £33.97 | £0 |
| March | 590 | 484 | 599 | 507 | £74.47 | £68.30 | £0 |
| April | 937 | 283 | 927 | 326 | £37.71 | £112.71 | £0 |
| May | 1001 | 315 | 950 | 312 | £45.14 | £113.99 | £0 |
| June | 1009 | 465 | 954 | 405 | £60.83 | £112.05 | £12.02 |
| July | 1213 | 408 | 1209 | 414 | £57.47 | £140.16 | £10.00 |
| August | 918 | 549 | 818 | 452 | £75.09 | £95.88 | £14.14 |
| September | 631 | 552 | 603 | 522 | £77.42 | £71.58 | £14.79 |
| Totals | 6646 | 4166 | 6392 | 4040 | £595.74 | £763.55 | £50.95 |
2025 figures here.
Axle is a 'virtual power station' who pay me £1/kWh a few times a month when they help to boost the grid. I assume that is at predicted times when demand could exceed what renewable sources can provide. There are many thousands of people with home batteries who can help to stabilise the grid without firing up more gas power stations. I just got another £25 for a referral of someone on Mastodon and he got the same reward. I only just discovered something on their site saying that GivEnergy users would not get the referral reward so I was surprised to still get it. They pay the £5/month for the GivEnergy web service since that company went bust and it is not too unfair to only let you have one of those rewards, but I am not complaining. So with their guaranteed £10 per month for exports I actually gain £15. In a full year with them I will be about £200 better off and that all helps to pay off the cost of the original solar install. It is hard to say exactly how long that will be if you take into account what else I could have done with the money, but we are saving well over £1000 per year.
As we enter autumn production drops a lot. The sun is lower in the sky and the days are shorter as well as the weather being more variable. I still save a fair bit by charging the battery overnight at cheap rate and can run the house from that all day. The electric car was charged up a few times and some of that was during the day at peak rate, but it still works out much cheaper than petrol. If it is plugged in on a sunny day then over half the power can come directly from the sun.
I am expecting the numbers to be better than last year over all as I am making smarter use of my power. We do not take too many special measures at home, but there are days when Octopus reward us for using less power at peak times in exchange for a free hour at the weekend. In the GivEnergy app I can easily specify when the charge and export the battery.
Shine on!
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