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| image from SEDA |
After doing a lot of home work, calculation, then I started to engage providers to visit my house for quotation and advises.
It is surprise to me how big differences it is from every provider, pricing is almost the same, it is the recommended panel or KW to install on my roof that surprise me. It can varies from 4KW - 12KW.
Hahahaha..... can you imagine, it is something like you were being recommended from Kancil (now only Viva) to Benz when you told them you need a car to carry only 4 person .
In the end, I selected a not so cheap supplier, just because he installed his house with the solar panel, he is my son's schoolmate's father, he stay damn near to me and he installed solar for years during the early age when the pricing by TNB is not that attractive.
To log down the activities here for my future reference:
1. Feb 13 - Mar 13 : visit with various provider
2. 6th April - final visit roof for physical check on the roof exact space
3. 25th April - submit documents
4. 9th, 10th and 11th May - solar brackets legs installation on roof and wiring preparation
5. 30th May - Seda approved
6. 4th June - payment of 25% to provider
---Added 24th June 2013 -----
Alliance Bank offer the renewable energy loan now, but, it is pretty high interest, BLR+xx % of 10 years loan. Just to note 1 thing, the SEDA rate is fixed return rate, it doesn't fluctuate, while BLR fluctuate and with current low BLR, the return is already not really that attractive, beware of in the case BLR surge, 1 may turn into -ve income.
7. Saw the SEDA approval certificate, guess that's where it is confirmed I secured the 7.2KW from the big piece of cake.
8. Signed the 4 sets of contract (contract with TNB), and changed the cheque to the provider as he said he is now having another company which serve purely for solar installation. His other company is doing electrical.
---Added 27th June 2013 -----
9. Continue of the work of bracket installation (the rail).
---Added 29th June 2013 -----
10. 28th June 2013 - Today noon time there come the provider bringing one of the most expensive component, the solar panel, it is really a very thin layer of 1 face black and 1 side white plastic :-). And the installation was running till quite late
11. 29th June 2013 - work continue from noon till around 6pm. Though I think they are pulling the cables all together from each piece of the panel
---Added 2nd July 2013 -----
12. 30th June 2013 - work continue from around 11am till 6pm. I was wondering what they did actually ? Apparently my house is kind of old, and all the 避雷针 lightning rod earthing is not working well. They used a meter to measure the reading, and it is not safe to warrant the future installed inverter is safe from lightning. Hence, been spending the whole day to ground in about 4 cobber rod deep into ground.
A chat with the supplier also highlight currently there are a lot of competition out there. But, it appears that SEDA did site visit again to house hold who already started the meter reading, even got payment. SEDA noticed the installation is not fully adhere to their requirement, and terminate the contract !! It ends up the owner have to use it as self consumption. From his experience it is already 2 cases last month !!
And then, I saw the news of Alliance Bank is starting up with the Renewable Energy Loan, but the rate is not that attractive. It is BLR++, remember, the BLR now is so low, what happened if it rises ? It will not ? Think twice, Indonesia has just announce they rise the interest rate. It would be even better if you go refinance your house as the rate is BLR--, so be smart.
I have been prompted so many questions when I told people I enroll to this project.
An investment that need 7 years to have break even seems to be a bit long and "too far, cant see", I agree.
But, it is sort of 'sure' profit, doing a business will need at least 4 -5 years (depends on what business) to break even, it is not a sure case. Study already tells success rate of a business is very low for the first few year, some more, you need to be fully dedicated your time to it. This solar panel, you don't need to hold the panel under the sun to generate the revenue, that's the different.
If to invest in some other channel, well, the hottest one in town is property, there's no sure case you get your rental, and of course, everyone tells me there's sure case they will get price appreciation. But, I am not sure if they really calculate the return with a calculator factor in the expenses, the waiting time period and the opportunity cost.
I did one for my old apartment, and the decision after knowing the result is I decided to sell my apartment off. Will share that in later post.
---Added 2nd September 2013 -----
13. 30th August 2013 - After calling the supplier for about 3 times within the period of July till August, at last I got his SMS on 30th Aug telling me TNB already sign the contract. Great, another milestone achieved.
However, I still need to wait for another 3 weeks at least to get the inverter ship from German to Malaysia, then installation of the inverter. Well, the bad thing about getting a small supplier is they try to get a lot of turn around on their cash flow, so jobs are done bit by bit, actually, it is not so nice when I see it. If compare to some other supplier, they will only take about 1-3 days to settle everything, so my house will not be so dirty and messy every round they are here, and we need to arrange people at home.
During this period, I noticed from advertisement, Seng Heng also involved in this business, can see the competition is getting steeper. And, TNB is going to hike the electrical bill next year, and, SEDA is asking for additional 1% of the renewal energy charges from the public (current is 1%, so later will be 2%). And, just yesterday, petrol price hike again. Share market is very volatile with a lot of bad news coming in, especially last 2 weeks the market drop badly.
Even I have yet receive any $$ from this investment, I can feel the saying "recession proof, economy volatility proof" kind of investment, even better than running a business.
====3rd October 2013 ========
14. today is when the supplier installed the inverter. For my house, 7.2KW installed with 2 inverters. It took the supplier around a day to finish the work. That includes the data collection box which is sitting inside the house.
This also means time to pay another certain % of the installation fees, but will wait for the supplier to tell me how much is it. I am a bit lost count after so many months of waiting.
====7th October 2013 ========
2 inverters, but 1 failed !! So start running with 1 inverter. Meaning I am doing charity as I am now providing the energy to my neighborhood. If I didn't remember wrongly, the SEDA contract of commencement dateline is November 2013. So I am not so sure how fast they can rectify the faulty inverter, get the meter in from Tenaga, but I think I am waited pretty too long already.
=====30th October 2013 ========
Everything seems run fine now. The inverter is running fine, make the 70% payment to the supplier.
=====7th November 2013 =========
TNB came, it is officially commencement of the reading. Though I was producing 7 days charity to TNB. It took them a day to complete the thing. The power supply in my house was told too high, not stable, not good for home appliance and also to the meter. So, they need to rectify, and while doing that, they cut down the power supply. At last, the watt supplied was lower down.
=============8th Jan 2014 ===================
Not sure why, 2 TNB guys came, within a timeframe of 1 week. So this is the first reading they did. I am not a good businessman, I really don't have time and discipline to monitor the reading everyday. Some more the reader is damn not user friendly, I need to connect to the port to read it ......
==============13th Jan 2014 ===============
The TNB guy came to write the first reading, so does the supplier come to collect the left over payment : another 5% cheque passed to him.
=============9th Feb 2014 ==================
TNB came again, this time they installed the wifi modem into the meter. So, it is now officially remote reading, the person do not need to come over to read my meter. BTW, where is my payment ? I have been waiting and waiting, how much did I lose ah .... need to count.
Ok, based on I collect my first payment 1st April 2014, I have lost around RM1454.00 of FD 3.5% !!
Meaning it is around 1.5 months of solar income loh ...yee.... damn .......
========24th Feb 2014 ====================
Got a letter from TNB again, telling me to install wifi, hello, can they coordinate better ha ? already install then say not installed .....
========4th Mac 2014 ====================
People still appear to record my solar reading, what wifi is that for ?
========5th Mac 2014 ====================
So, i call the letter printed number again, and they said their record do not have modem number, so need to come again to double confirm, so mah fan ......tomorrow they will be coming
========6th Mac 2014 ====================
So, they come and record the meter number and cabut.Wei wei, where is my money ?
========10th Mac 2014 ====================
The supplier passed all the documents to me. So, safe keep them, if not future susah to sell or change name of the solar owner.
========7th April 2014 ====================
Payment come in. First payment for the firs 3 months (Nov 13, Dec 13 and Jan 14), but I noticed the first months reading seems not tally, suspect there must be 1 of the converter had problem, the supplier noticed it after 1 or 2 weeks when he came back to inspect, he corrected it, but never tell me ... though I am not smart, but I am not stupid.
========10th April 2014 ====================
I got my account registered with TNB online service, so I can monitor the readings. Apparently my 7th April assumption is correct. The reading for the rest of the months are quite consistent one .... and, I got my 2nd payment already.
========12th April 2014 ====================
My roof leaking badly. So many spot leaking. I called the supplier, he came immediately during the rain and noticed 1 spot is because the roof tar cracked, but another spot seems is a different issue not related to his solar panel. OK, time to spend money again. This is second time I called the supplier to come for the roof leaking already.
