Solar panels are brilliant in the summer. Long days, strong sun, your panels working at maximum efficiency, bills are lower than ever, and the bank feels a little healthier. In the UK, summer is the one time you don’t really need the heating on, which is typically one of households’ biggest energy drains. While this is great for your wallet over summer, it is also a bit of a double-edged sword – as all that lovely free electricity your solar panels are generating mostly goes towards kettles, washing machines, fans, game consoles, and whatever else you’ve got running.
When it comes to using solar to warm your home, the biggest opportunity lies in the middle seasons. Those slightly chilly April evenings. August nights that are warmer than usual but still a bit nippy. September, October. These are the months where solar generation is still going strong, and the temptation to put the heating on starts to flare up. And that’s exactly where the combination of solar panels and electric heating starts to make a lot of sense.
Why Electric Heating And Solar Are A Surprisingly Good Match
Let’s be honest, electric heating has had a bit of a reputation problem. For years, it was seen as the expensive option, something you fell back on if you couldn’t get gas. And on a standard grid tariff, running electric heaters, heat pumps, or electric underfloor heating is typically pricier per unit than gas.
But here’s where the maths changes completely: if you’re generating your own electricity from solar panels and using that to power your electric heating, you’re not paying grid rates for it. You’re essentially heating your home with sunshine. Which sounds like something off a motivational poster, but it’s actually just good energy economics.
Homes that combine solar generation with electric heating systems can significantly reduce their reliance on gas, cut their overall energy bills, and make a meaningful dent in their carbon footprint all at once. And with gas prices doing some genuinely alarming things over the past few years, reducing how much you burn feels pretty smart right now.
How Does It Actually Work Day-To-Day?
Your solar panels generate electricity during daylight hours. That electricity powers whatever is switched on in your home at the time. Whether you’ve got an electric heating system running during the day, underfloor heating warming your rooms, an infrared panel in the kitchen, or an electric radiator in the home office, you can run them directly from your solar generation rather than the grid.
The key is timing. Your panels are generating most strongly between roughly 10 am and 3 pm. So heating your home during those hours, or pre-heating it so it stays warm into the evening, means you use free electricity instead of paying for it.
This is especially useful if you work from home or have elderly relatives in the house who need warmth throughout the day. Instead of running the boiler or paying peak grid rates, you cover much of that heating load with what your roof generates.
How To Heat Your Home At Night Using Solar Power?
The obvious limitation is evenings. By 6 pm, when the temperature drops and you actually want the heating on, your panels have knocked off for the day. Without a battery, that evening heating load comes entirely from grid electricity.
With a battery, it’s different. You store your surplus daytime generation and pull from it in the evening. So the solar electricity you generated at noon is sitting there, ready to power your heating at 8 pm, when you’re watching telly with a blanket and pretending Christmas isn’t fast approaching.
A well-sized battery paired with solar and electric heating means you run your home on your own generated power for a much larger share of the day. During the shoulder months, especially when generation is still reasonable and heating demand is moderate, a solar-plus-battery-plus-electric-heating setup can cover a genuinely impressive share of your energy needs without touching the grid.
If you’re interested in what that would look like for your home specifically, we’d love to chat. We design every system at Entire Renewables around your actual usage, not a generic template.
What About Heat Pumps?
Heat pumps deserve a special mention because they’ve grown massively in popularity over the past few years, and for good reason. An air-source heat pump is an electric heating system, but it’s much more efficient than most other options on the market. For every unit of electricity it uses, it generates three to four units of heat. Compare that to a traditional electric heater, which gives you one unit of heat for one unit of electricity, and you can see why heat pumps are generating so much excitement.
Many homes now combine a heat pump with solar panels and battery setups to get the best possible results. You’re powering an already very efficient electric heating system with electricity you generate for free. Running costs drop substantially, and you can eliminate your dependence on gas entirely if you want.
The upfront cost of heat pumps is real and worth factoring in, but with the right system design, the long-term savings add up.
Solar Diverters: The Unsung Hero
Solar diverters don’t get enough attention. If you’ve got an immersion heater for hot water, a solar diverter is a brilliant bit of kit that sits between your solar panels and your hot water tank, redirecting any surplus solar electricity straight to heating your water, rather than exporting it to the grid for payment.
So, on a sunny day in September, when your panels generate more than your household uses, rather than that excess trickling into the grid, it can heat your water tank. Free hot water from the sun. It’s not glamorous, but it is genuinely satisfying.
Solar diverters are relatively affordable to add to an existing system. They can make a noticeable difference to your gas usage if you’re still using gas for hot water alongside electric heating elsewhere in the home.
Reducing Gas Reliance: The Bigger Picture
One question we get asked a lot is whether solar can help someone go entirely off gas. And the honest answer is: it depends on your setup, your home, and how you heat it. But solar combined with electric heating is absolutely a step in that direction.
If you’re currently on gas central heating but you’re thinking about the future, whether that’s replacing an ageing boiler, commissioning an extension, or you just want to be less exposed to gas price swings, going electric for at least part of your heating and pairing it with solar is a smart transition strategy.
You don’t have to do everything at once. Some customers start with solar, add a battery a year or two later, and then switch to a heat pump when their boiler eventually needs replacing. Each step makes the next one more worthwhile.
Is My Home Suitable?
Good question. There are a few things worth considering. Your solar system needs to be sized appropriately. If you’re planning to use solar to offset electric heating, a larger system will obviously cover more of your load than a smaller one. We always design systems around your actual energy usage, so if heating is part of the picture, we factor that in from the start.
Your electric heating system matters too. A heat pump will make your solar work harder for you than a basic electric radiator does, simply because it converts electricity into heat much more efficiently.
Your home’s insulation also plays a huge role. The better insulated your home is, the less energy you need to keep it warm, and the more of that demand your solar can actually cover. It’s not the most exciting thing to spend money on, but loft insulation and draught-proofing offer some of the best returns on investment for home energy.
The Bottom Line
Solar panels and electric heating are not just compatible. They’re actually a really natural pairing, especially as the UK moves away from gas and towards electrifying heat. Use your solar generation to power your heating during the day, store surplus in a battery for the evenings, and add a solar diverter to handle your hot water. Done well, it meaningfully cuts your bills, reduces your carbon footprint, and makes your home much less dependent on whatever gas prices decide to do next.
If you want to know what this could look like for your home, we offer free no-obligation quotes. If you decide to proceed, you don’t pay a penny until we have installed the system and it’s working. Curious what solar could do for your heating bills? Get Your Free Quote or give us a ring on 01606 374 994.
