In our previous posts we focused on the
excess energy that can be generated using photovoltaic (PV) panels and on
on its trends. In this post we will focus on the price of the solar PV installation through two interactive visualizations based on the
latest data provided by the UK government about the cost per kW of PV deployments by month.
Cost per kW installed by size band
In the following chart we can compare the cost per kW of solar deployments on a monthly basis for different size bands:
Each point of this chart represents the median of the costs in a particular month while the error bars represent the 95% confidence interval of the cost in a given month. Which means that we can be 95% certain that the mean cost per kW lies within the two values reported by the error bar assuming that the cost data entered is a non-biased sample.
We can note that the cost per kW installed has remained almost static over the 12 months. With the median of the cost per kW ranging from £1830 in June 2013 to £2010 in October 2013.
The chart also shows that in the higher size bands the cost per kW is lower, but since the confidence intervals are wider, it is also more changeable.
Number of PV installations
In this figure we compare the number of installations over a monthly period. As in the previous chart, we differentiated deployments into three different size bands:
Here we note that in correspondence of the decreases of the deployment costs, June 2013 and March 2014, the number of installations substantially increased. The month with the lowest number of installation is July 2013 while the month with the highest is March 2014. We also have an increasing trend of installation from June 2013 to November 2013.
