Yes, and anything black in full sun gets hot! Before PV we had solar water heating, and there was a safety cutoff which stopped the water tank from being heated beyond 75°C. When this happened you could see the temperature of the rooftop panels (now uncooled) soar to well above 100°C which was frustrating as this energy could not be recovered. The system would not restart until everything had cooled to below 75° which in practice meant the following day.
For PV panel performance I was thinking of this article I read a while ago, which gives a fuller explanation:
Air temperature and black body temperatures are 2 very different things. Although the first will tend to cool the second. If you were able to measure the temperature of your PV panels last week id expect something in excess of 65 or 70 degrees C ( depending on wind and ambient temperature). I have a thermal imaging “ gun”, ill get it on my panels next time the sun is out. Although they are really a relative tool unless you know the exact emissvity of the object.
curious as I am, last year on a very sunny day - and we had a lot last year - I was on one of my flat roofs where we have panels raised at about 30 degrees on a base with air flow. The roof itself was almost too hot to touch - but the raised panel I touched, it was very warm, but it was not hot as the roof as I was expecting it to be - made an impression on me . I know not scientific.
Good thinking on the temperature gun, perhaps I’ll dig it out if I can find it and measure the panels on a very hot day again.
I heard from Octopus today that they had set up my export account. It took them just six days from when I sent them the letter from my DNO (UK Power Networks) which gave me agreement to export as per my G99 application (so no G100 was required) and allocated me an export MPAN (so Octopus didn’t have to separately ask them for that, which undoubtedly saved some time).
Octopus is apparently intending to start from today as they asked me for a current meter reading (so I have lost the 60 or so kWh that was exported before they set up my export MPAN), but I’m not too bothered about that. Their variable export rate is 12p per kWh currently.
Red shift due to an expanding universe…this shifts the wavelength away from the energy producing UV to the heat producing IR.
An alternative explanation supported by American ‘Conservatives’ is that the solar panels are sucking the energy out of the sun, making it weaker. Seriously…this was one argument against solar power.
Going back to the temperature effect…..we had a relatively cool day with sunshine and heavy showers…..we were nudging our theoretical 10 kw panel output a few times late morning. It was not as bright sunshine as last week…..still on a learning curve.
Seriously….the county is reverting back to the anti-intellectual dark-ages.
‘Despite some legitimate concerns, Woodland became the subject of ridicule as some of the public’s remarks went viral on websites such as Huffington Post, Ars Technica, and Daily Kos aggregated their remarks (one headline read: “North Carolina citizenry defeat pernicious Big Solar plan to suck up the Sun”)’
And…
”US town rejects solar panels amid fears they ‘suck energy from the sun’, cause cancer - and will harm house prices
A retired science teacher said she was concerned the panels would prevent plants in the area from growing”
GivEnergy customers might want to check out Axle Energy who will pay for your GivEnergy Premium subscription as well as paying you £1 per kWh for events they run, with a minimum £10 per month.
There are referral codes out there with Gary Does Solar and Tim & Kat’s Green Walk YouTube channels.
I understand that Axle only control your battery during their events, so not all of the time. You can also opt out of an event if you wish. As the £1 per kWh payment is on top of any export tariff you are getting, allowing Axle to manage your battery during their events will generate a better return.
For GivEnergy users you get access to the GivEnergy Premium subscription for free, so that’s an additional saving if you want to use that service. It’s a limited period offer btw, so there is a need to act quickly.
Im not hearing great things about Giv’s premium offerings? So far looks to be what we used to get for free? Ill wait for the dust to settle to see if i need it.
Im not too keen on having an api controlling my inverter. To be fair, with octopus, the inverter charges from 23.30 to 05.30, then sits in eco. The only things I really do is dump the nattery and charge if I get a free power up. But not had one in over a year now. My requirements from the app are just to change charge times if octopus change their times.
As always, there are choices and preferences. Saving money is one. A simple life is another. Some others love digging in to the complexities. We are all different. No right or wrong.