Solar Basics
Panels degrade, and the first year does not resemble the rest
Output falls along two separate curves — a small initial drop in the first weeks of exposure, then a slow…
· 4 min read
Radhika Iyer
Features writer, Power Your Roof
Radhika writes about solar basics, batteries, bills & tariffs, mostly the parts other people skip and is unreasonably interested in the detail nobody else checks.
8 articles
Solar Basics
Monitoring only helps once you know what a dull week looks like
A generation figure carries no diagnostic weight on its own, and the useful skill is separating ordinary…
· 4 min read
Solar Basics
Bifacial modules and trackers are sound ideas that rarely fit a house
Both technologies earn their keep at utility scale for reasons that a flush-mounted domestic roof cannot…
· 4 min read
Batteries
Chemistry decides how a battery fails long before it decides capacity
The word lithium covers several quite different chemistries, and the one that suits a car is not…
· 4 min read
Installation
A solar roof changes how a fire is fought
Pulling the main switch leaves the array and its cables live, which is why fire services approach a…
· 4 min read
Efficiency
Heating a room nobody is in is the loss controls exist to stop
Zoning, radiator valves and scheduling all attack the same waste from different directions, and the more…
· 4 min read
Batteries
Handing control of your battery to somebody else
Aggregators pay households to let a remote operator charge and discharge their storage on the network’s…
· 3 min read
Bills & Tariffs
The cleanest hour to use electricity is not always the cheapest
Grid carbon intensity varies through the day for reasons that only partly overlap with price, so optimising…
· 3 min read