Will Solar Panels get cheaper?
This is a question that many of us have thought about, is it the right time to buy solar panels? Will they get cheaper or will there be a new grant or incentive available? Over the years we have seen the rise and fall in the cost of installing solar panels to your home.
When did the price peak?
Back when the green deal and the feed-in tariff were alive and kicking, around 10 years ago at this point in time, the demand for solar panels was quite high, and I remember the panels were expensive too. Installing solar panels now is generally much cheaper than back then. How can this be though, aren’t the panels better than ever? Well you would be right in both of these statements, the panels produced now are much more efficient than ones in the past. Moving from 250w a panel, up to 400w on some solar panels these days on the same surface area as before. Meaning even smaller roofs can begin to benefit from having solar installed, even in the UK.
The good news is that solar panels generally have a better warranty, and longer lifespan only losing a tiny fraction of efficiency each year. Meaning after 25 years of use your panels should still be around 85% effective of when they were installed.
So with all that being said, it is a bit strange that the cost of solar panels is less than it has been for a long while, and it only seems to be going down. Well the demand for solar panels was a lot less over the years than it ever has been. So while the innovation has been going into solar panels, the demand wasn’t there for it, keeping the price fairly low. Another factor of this was the much loved feed-in tariff was removed, meaning some people were left with no real benefit to having solar installed. Times have changed since then, the government now has the Smart Export Guarantee (SEG) scheme available, meaning you can sell every unit of unused electricity back to the grid. This scheme has been seen fairer than the previous feed-in tariff, since it was changed a lot over the years. Battery storage has been a huge benefit to people who have solar panels installed, especially in the UK. This means if you aren’t using your electricity during the day, you can make perfect use of it at night managing to keep those energy bills down.
Talking about energy bills, this is another reason we have seen a huge increase in demand for solar panels. In the start of 2023 there was a huge increase in the cost of gas and electricity. With that only to be getting worse now that the support payments have stopped being issued from the government. So back to the original question, will solar panels get cheaper? This year the price of solar panels is already on the rise, due to the demand, the manufacturers are struggling to keep up with the demand and the rising energy prices and set the perfect environment for solar panels to be in high demand. Coupled with battery storage, 0% VAT on energy saving materials like battery storage, solar panels and heat pumps, then it is safe to say that at least for a while the prices are going to steadily increase.
You can learn more about battery storage by following this link: Battery Storage
You can learn more about PV Solar Panels by following this link: Solar Panels
You can learn more about the available incentives by following this link: Available Incentives
If you still have questions or would like some further information please contact us by visiting this page here.
