Checking your roof, wall or garden
What your wall is made of decides whether the planning rules cover a panel at all. We check that first, before anyone gives you a price.
Read moreWe supply and fit plug-in solar panels for homes across the South West.
Send us your postcode and where you'd like the panel. We'll check it against the planning rules, tell you what it would generate at your address, and arrange a local electrician if you need a socket fitted.
- We check the planning rules before anyone quotes
- We don't take commission from any manufacturer
- If it won't work at your house, we'll tell you
Tell us where the panel would go
Your name, postcode and email, plus the roof, wall or garden you have in mind. We reply by email with what the rules allow there and what it would make in a year.
We reply by email. We don't pass your details to anyone and we don't take commission.
822kWh a year
That is what one 800 watt device makes on an unshaded south facing roof pitch near Exeter. Only the South East does better. Treat it as the most you could expect. What you save depends on how much electricity you are using while the panel is generating.
Porlock Bay from Exmoor, Somerset. Generation modelled with PVGIS for 0.8 kWp, 35 degrees, due south, 14 per cent system losses. Queried 13 September 2026.
What we can arrange for you
We do three things, and each one has its own page below. Send us your postcode when you want an answer for your own house.
Fitting, and an outdoor socket
You can plug the panel in yourself. If you need a weatherproof socket outside, we get a local electrician to quote for that work.
Read more
Telling your network operator
The operator needs your name, your email and the address the panel went in at. We fill the form in with you.
Read moreImportant if you have a balcony
Timber balconies and cladding are not covered by the new planning rules
The planning rules for solar equipment were rewritten on 27 August 2026. For houses and for blocks of flats, they no longer cover a plug-in panel fixed to a wooden wall, to a balcony, or to timber cladding. A twelve month transitional period runs to 27 August 2027, and until then you can follow either the old rules or the new ones.
A house that falls outside the rules can only get there through a planning application. The government expects that to cost a lot next to the price of the kit. We check the surface first so that you know where you stand before you spend anything.
Planning Portal guidance on solar equipment mounted on a house or a block of flats, read 13 September 2026.
How much a panel makes in the South West, depending on where you put it
All four figures below are for the same address near Exeter and the same 800 watt device. Where you put the panel makes more difference than which part of the country you live in.
PVGIS, four mountings, 0.8 kWp with 14 per cent system losses, unshaded, at one point near Exeter. Queried 13 September 2026. A region is not a point, and a coastal site is not an inland one.
Telling National Grid Electricity Distribution once it's installed
South West England is one distribution licence area, and the operator for it is National Grid Electricity Distribution (South West) plc. Our map is a working one, so confirm yours on the operator's own postcode checker before you send anything. You can also ring 105. The call is free from anywhere in England, Scotland and Wales, and it puts you through to the company that runs the wires in your street.
- Cornwall
- Devon
- Somerset
- Dorset
- Wiltshire
- Gloucestershire
- Bristol
- Bath
Questions people ask us
Do I need planning permission?
Usually not, but it depends on your house. A plug-in panel relies on the permitted development right for small scale solar, and that right has limits on how far the panel sticks out, on conservation areas, on listed buildings and now on wooden surfaces. If your house meets the conditions, there is no application. If it does not, there is one. We tell you which applies to you before you spend anything.
How many can I have?
One per household. The product specification allows one device per final ring circuit and then defers to the network rules, and Engineering Recommendation G98 Issue 2 Amendment 1 sets the limit at one per home.
Can I add a battery to it?
No. Storage was left out of the interim product specification, both as a battery on its own and as a device with storage built in. A kit sold to you with a battery attached is outside what was approved in August.
What will it cost?
We do not publish a price, because it depends on the kit you choose and on the socket work at your house. We would rather look at your house and give you a real figure.
Send us your postcode and we'll take it from there
Tell us the postcode and what the panel would be fixed to. We will write back with what the rules allow there and what it would make in a year. If it will not work at your house, we will tell you that.
Send us your postcode