connection to the national grid

hi guys

im hoping someone on here can help me out.we bought a house in lincolnshire that is not hooked up to the national grid when we contacted western elect they quoted us £60,000 to connect us.is there other comany,s out there that can do the connection or has it gat to be done throu western elect.

rob

Reply to
furby2009
Loading thread data ...

How much!!?

How far are you from the nearest low or medium voltage power cable (240V (hint: road with houses and/or streetlamps) - or an 11kV feed (rural will be overhead a lot of the time, 3 wires, probably wooden pole but with moderately substantial insulators).

Reply to
Tim Watts

you are facing a monopoly.

However te price is negotiable and furthermore, there is a lot you can DIY. If you trench the place and prepare a transformer pad, and, if you have access to the land over which the cables will come, trench that as well, it could be a lot less.

However it is when all is said and done a cost we simply take for granted that is actually not that unfair.

There is usually weeks of legal shit to do before you string cables over or under someone else's land, then there is a lot of very safety conscious wiring and cable laying, testing and then finally a disconnection, isolation and reconnection of part of the local grid, which if prolonged may need other people to be equipped with generators.

Not to mention possible road closures etc.

Cost me nearly £20 grand just to get over an 11KV line running over the roof.. the actual cost was £30k but the grid were happy to toss in £12k as part of their 'lets get rid of all this 11KV overhead' budget. They don't like it - too prone to wind and tree damage.

So have a long talk with them and see how to get the price down. But you wont get it done for 5k for sure.

But it should add 60k to the house value anyway.

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

No. When I had my bit undergrounded the man said 'Let's put it this way: we are not installing any more overhead 11KV lines'

I think 33KV they will, but not 11KV.

I am not sure about 240V..but they dont run that very far if they can..too lossy.

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Not an unusual quandary if very isolated. I hope the price you paid for the house reflected it's lack of power. You can buy a decent generator and a lot of red diesel for £60K

AWEM

Reply to
Andrew Mawson

One of the chaps who quoted for my solar PV had a customer in a similar situation. He had been quoted so much for connecting his Grand Design to the grid that he decided on principle that he would not pay.

Instead he went for a massive PV array, together with substantial battery system. It hadn't been fully commissioned at the time, and I don't think it was actually an economic solution, but he was apparently in a position to afford it.

Chris

Reply to
Chris J Dixon

You need 6 months of batteries to tide you over the winter. At 1kw average household drain, that's just under 5MWhrs. a truck battery of 80 Ah is about a kilowatt hour

So you only need about 5,000 of them.

Shouldn't cost more than half a million quid to replace every 5 years.

Cheap compared with getting a grid connection laid in.

Obviously.

That's why every body is doing it.

Instead of building power stations

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

In the real world, CIT have an array doing enough electrical power to run a house that cost about £1.00 per Kwh a few years ago. A roof covered in solar cells and a shed full of milk float batteries to last them overnight and through dull periods. No heating of any sort, not even a kettle, just lights, TV and suchlike.

Reply to
John Williamson

Sorry, that's CAT, the Centre for Alternative Technology, in Wales.

Reply to
John Williamson

ISTR that they also get a few kW from being at the bottom of a quarry with a reasonable water supply a couple of hundred feet above.

Reply to
Newshound

In a different real world, I spent the last week in a hut in Norway which was still getting enough solar power on a small not-terribly-well-placed panel to do what was needed (and indeed was still doing so around Christmas). If the panels don't stop working in a Norwegian winter then they're going to be still working in the UK.

Reply to
Clive George

What was it getting, this "small" panel, and what was the leccy being used for?

Reply to
Tim Streater

As well as some wind pumping. It's an interesting place to visit, even if all it proves is that alternative energy can't support our current way of life, and the alternatives aren't as nice to live with. Unless we get the nukes going, that's what we're all going to get, though.

Reply to
John Williamson

Not massive amounts, lighting, not much of it, but some. Yes, there's less power than in summer, but there is still some.

Reply to
Clive George

Norwegian winters probably sunnier than ours

*shrug* depends if you want no fridges, no dishwashers, no electric kettle, no electric cooker, no gas cooker, no oil cooker, no central heating, just the one computer cum TV and then only for a few hours a day..
Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Its about 10:1 ratio wise IIRC

formatting link
90% of the power is generated in summer, when you don't need it and

10% in winter when you do :-)
Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Mmmm, it would be useful to calculate on a sliding scale...

- Running a generator on red diesel for peak demand loads (Washer, Dryer, Kettle, Microwave, Cooker).

- Running off Solar PV for background loads (Fridge-Freezer, Lighting, TV, Laptop).

Precisely how the place is heated is going to be an important consideration.

Solar PV needs a mains inverter with shelf spare unit (they are not that reliable and not cheap). Batteries have a finite life, specific usage profile for optimum life and substantial cost.

Lighting needs careful selection, TV would be low backlight demand (TN v PVA/IPS LCD and certainly not plasma), laptop low energy not difficult at least compared to old P4 Prescott (appropriate choice of fat ass name).

As TNP says, the huge component of a grid connection is the "groundworks". The transformer and associated switchgear may be sized for multiple houses incidentally, you are not just paying for yourself but essentially a "new development". This is why some people block mains gas coming to towns, it keeps developers away. Likewise lack of electricity can keep anyone away as initial inquiries regarding cost are met with high ass-covering estimates.

You CAN get other quotes for grid connects as I recall, but usually not simple domestic. This is not likely to be simple domestic because of MV cable, TX, Box & Digging & Concrete & Teeth Sucking & Tea Drinking involved. So check carefully.

Example, moving a gas meter 0-2m with no groundworks and no re- instatement =3D =A3408. Moving a gas meter 0-2m with groundworks & re- instatement =3D =A31050. When the distance gets to 20m, it gets worse, more than that and they ask you what colour Ferrari they look good in as they come out.

Reply to
js.b1

And Clive, It'd be nice also to know which part of Norway you're talking about. A lot of it is north of the Arctic Circle.

Reply to
Tim Streater

The PV works in mid-winter, so obviously it's not north of the Arctic Circle. It's just a solar panel, it's not magic.

(somewhere about the same up as Bergen).

Reply to
Clive George

Mmm, so 09.30 to 15.30, in mid-winter, approx. Really not sure why you're mentioning it.

Reply to
Tim Streater

HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.