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UK supermarkets to start selling plug-in solar panels for £500. But there’s a catch
(www.independent.co.uk)
this post was submitted on 20 May 2026
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Everyone doing the "it works in Germany" dance needs to remember that the UK, almost uniquely, has ring main domestic wiring, which presents unique safety challenges.
(Specifically, in-wall wiring that is under-rated compared to the fuse that protects it (e.g. 24A wall wiring on a 32A fuse), which is only safe if the ring is in-tact (no undetected breaks) and, critically for this application, the load is evenly distributed around the ring.)
Yes, it can and should be made to work - but it is not as straightforward as "herp derp works in Germany so yolo".
We are talking about 800W peak, that's not even 4A.
A fifty percent increase in the margin for failure, you say?
Oh well, that's fine then. No need for concern.
Yes, I absolutely have understood that. I also understand that that means the assumptions that a ring main are built on - that the distribution of load around the ring will be even in relation to the supply point - no longer apply.
In a ringmain, any individual stretch of the inwall wiring is under-rated. A single two-gang wall socket (with 2 perfectly legal and standard compliant 13A fused appliances/multisockets plugged in) can draw more current then the cable in the wall is rated for. It is "safe" because it relies on the current being drawn, on average, equally from both sides of the ring. If you plug a generator in that is closer to the socket, that is no longer true - more current will be drawn on the shorter path to the generator than the longer path back to the fuse box. An already marginal system is now unsafe.
I'm not saying it can't be done, and I hope it will be done, but it works in Gemany is a fucking stupid comment that we keep seeing but is irrelevant because Germany (and almost everywhere else on Earth) has a completely different domestic electrical system.
13A at 230 Volt are 3 kilowatt..So, you'd need to connect 6 kilowatt. Today, the only common home appliances that draw so much power are electric stoves. (Yes there was the idea to heat more electrically using nuclear power, in the 1970s) The other way would be to heat the whole flat with electricity. That is possible in some circumstances (heating broken), but does not happen at times where you have a lot of solar power.
And on top of that, the problem with the ring main system that you describe is not specific to using balcony solar. You can bring down any extra risk back to the previous level by reducing the main fuse by 3.5 A, or about 10%.
Are you labouring under the misapprehension that the sun doesn't shine in the winter? That sounds like fossil fuel industry FUD...
Look, why - national stereotypes notwithstanding - are you apparently incapable of saying "oh, right, I don't realise that, I understand that comparisons with Germany are not particularly useful, but I hope they find a way to make it work", instead of endlessly doubling down on your pig-headed ignorance?
National stereotypes notwithstanding.
Looks like this.
By the way - Explanation of the term FUD. Who is appealing to fear here, citing theoretical risk with no actual facts?
So, if this is really not safe by principle, why do people not put in smaller fuses to begin with? Whether they use balcony solar or not?
If you are really afraid of it, you can put in a smaller main fuse which has 3.5 A less - about 10% of a standard UK home installation. But 32 A is a lot, that system was designed for electric heaters. If anything, in the UK installations should be safer today because of the wall plug fuses.
"That system" was not "designed for electric heaters" (I have no idea where this ridiculous myth comes from, ) it was designed to cut costs because copper was expensive after the war.
In-plug fuses do not make it safe, they help mitigate two critical flaws: the first, that a faulty appliance can draw 32A through a 13A cable without blowing the distribution fuse, and secondly (relevant to this case) they make it harder - but not impossible - to unbalance the ring by plugging too much load into a single socket.
But it's only a mitigation, it doesn't make it safe. A standard two-gang wall plate on its own is all that is required to overload the inwall wiring (26A from two sockets on a 24A feed protected by a 32A breaker.) Adding 4A of feed-in as well is a significant bump to the risk of an already unsafe system.
And sure, nobody is going to notice the problem on day 1, and as long as the only electrical appliances you use are mobile phone chargers there is never going to be a problem. But a while down the line when the householder decides to plug in a couple of the new AC units they feel they can now justify because they're powering them off solar, whose maximum draw just happens to coincide with maximum solar production, that's when the smoke will come...
(And that's ignoring the ubiquitous DIY'd spur off the ring for the conservatory or extension, or the accidentally broken ring when someone replaced a wallbox and now they actually have two 24A radials on a 32A fuse - all far from uncommon in any UK house that ever had a home improvement nut living in it.)
To me, that looks like scaremongering from the fossil industry. The same as rhe claim that EV cars have not enough reach or often burn up, killing their passengers.
Or that wind power plants kill bats.
Or that with wind and solar instead of going full nuclear, the lights would go off in Germany.
Then you're an idiot.