RHA Wales – Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council ORP 3.2

Background

This project installed solar PV to 107 social rented homes in the CF42 and CF40 postal areas.  The project began in April 2024 and is set to complete in March 2025.  The installations were made by GB-Sol, a Welsh based manufacturer and installer of supplied and fitted the PV systems.  iOPT monitoring was used to comply with the environmental sensor requirements which was installed by local contractor Flair. RHA Wales worked with GB-Sol to design the solar PV systems for each home to give the greatest increase in SAP ratings possible, in order to give tenants as much free energy as possible to use.  EPC A/rdSAP 92 was our key driver in preparation for the requirements of WHQS 2023.

Project learning

The key learning from this project was the new PAS standard in relation to batteries. Following review of this, RHA decided (with WG approval) to not install batteries. This enabled us to increase the number of homes in the project by around 50%.

The project is projected to make around 33 homes EPC A and around 60 homes EPC B with the remainder EPC C.

We have also had an issue with one block of flats in which the top floor flat will not allow access and so we are having to install the inverters in an external cabinet as we can not access the loft space for the inverter installation.

Project innovation

RHA utilized the services of GB-Sol who are a local Welsh manufacturer and installer of Solar PV panels.

Challenges

Access has continued to be a problem. We have received 14 refusals from tenants despite trying to convince them. This has resulted, in some cases, substituting in void properties instead as we felt that this may then increase the letting potential of the properties.

We faced no challenges with workforce or skills. GB-Sol are an experienced specialist contractor and Flair once trained by iOPT were competent to install the IES systems.