Solar Panels Facing North East

If you have the option to place the panels in more of a north east or north west direction it is.

Solar panels facing north east. The orientation of the house also matters. Hi mark i am looking at the option of installing a east west and north facing solar system on my shed roof that has low pitch of around 10 degrees. For example in brisbane if your panels are facing west 270 and are angled 20 from horizontal you will get 89 of the energy compared to the optimum orentation of north and 30. Technically east facing panels can get as much sun as west facing ones as long as there are no other issues like morning fog or clouds or shade.

In general solar panels that are oriented directly east or directly west will produce about 20 percent less electricity than if they were facing south. Even with this decrease in performance solar panels will produce enough electricity to save you hundreds of dollars a year. If the roof were steeper say 4 12 then the north facing array would be 29 worse. If you went with a professional solar installer they probably had a good reason to install panels facing east rather than west.

I get asked this a lot and there isn t really a simple answer. I understand how the east west setup works but i am wondering about the north. If your property faces east or west panels can still generate good yields. I would be grateful for any thoughts suggestions on the direction to face solar panels.

We are looking at installing a 5kw system lg neon 2 panels and fornius inverter on a double storey house and had initially thought of splitting the panels between our north east and west facing roofs so that we got production over most of the day 8 panels north 4 east and 4 west. However under the right circumstances it is possible to have an east west split of solar panels on a single inverter input like the diagram above imagine the left hand 3 panels facing west and the right hand 3 panels facing east and still have almost the same performance as if they were on separate strings attached to a two seperate inverter inputs. I hope they kept you informed. Why orientation matters with rooftop solar.

Depending on your location and roof pitch you re going to lose somewhere between 10 20 efficiency as a result of not having panels facing in a due north direction. You either accept that your output will be down to the sort of levels in the table above or you spend a little more money and try to maximise the your output with technology. This table shows you how much energy you can expect to get from almost any combination of solar panel direction and angle in the capital cities compared to the optimum orientation. But if the house is facing south southwest 30 off of perfectly south then the equator facing roof is only 14 better.

However the economics of installing solar panels on a roof that does not face the south still usually stack up for the homeowner. Can solar panels be fitted if your roof is east west facing.