Thermodynamic Test results - Not good

[MCS Renewables]

WPZ in Switzerland have tested a thermodynamic system
test number B-024-12-12

Tested for Energie EST Lda of Lote in Portugal. between 08.08.2012 and 13.08.2012.

It was tested as a domestic hot water heat pump (ie NOT solar thermal)

The test report 250 litre cylinder heated fropm 10.3 to 52.3, a rise of 42C , therefore the COP @ 15degrees C ambient temperature is 1.76.

Being as a decent heat pump can achieve a COP of over 3 at +5 degrees these thermodynamics kits are rubbish and should be used as skip liners.

The cylinders are also not WRAS approved.

Also
1kwhr of gas produces 190 grammes of CO2
1kwhr of elec produces 470 grammes of CO2
1kwhr of LPG produces 230 grammes of CO2
1kwhr of Oil produces 250 grammes of CO2

So unless you are installing in an all electric property these will never qualify for any incentive, ever, and at over £6000 for a COP of 1.74 the customers would have been better just burning the immersion heater as they will never get their money back.

The model shown here :- Energie Energia Solar Termodinmica - Products - ECO 200I
claims 390 watts for 150 litres of water so 9.36KW
it takes 1.16 watts per cubic metre x .15 x 50 litres so 8.7KW
So this model has a COP of 0.93 !!!!
And that is using the information from their web site ......

This kit needs leaving in Portugal where it may perform better, up to a COP of 2.73 , which is still poor at 15 degrees compared to most normal heat pumps.

 

[solarsavings]

MCS
Do you have a link?

 

[Gavin A]

I've found some test results listed, and they give it a COP of 2.7 or 3.3 depending on which method is used, with 4.1kWh used to heat a 250l tank to 53 deg.

It unfortunately doesn't say what that starting water temperature was, but a 250l tank is going to take in the region of 12kWh to heat to 53deg from somewhere around 10deg starting temperature.

12:4.1 = a COP of 2.9.

So not the best ever cop, but still not bad for heating water to 53deg.

http://institute.ntb.ch/fileadmin/Institute/IES/pdf/WPZ_Bulletin_01-2012.pdf page 18, Energie Est, lda, Eco 250esm

assuming this is the right kit under test.

 

[Eco Deal]

Are these panels covered by RHI ? or FITS ? or NONE ?

 

[wazzer]

I wonder how many of these units are fitted legally with full F Gas and unvented Part G also registered with building control as is a required

 

[Gavin A]

All the companies who've approached us about this have mentioned the F Gas requirements, and all MCS certified SWH companies would already have to have their unvented tickets and be registered with a CPS for building regs compliance.

I suspect there will be a few who're doing it without F Gas, but probably not that many - though it does sound like it's being scam marketed in some parts of the country, so maybe where this is happening.

 

[wazzer]

Surely they must be WRAS approved to get in the country and for companies to register them

 

[solarsavings]

What has wras got to do with it?

 

[Gavin A]

The model shown here :- Energie Energia Solar Termodinmica - Products - ECO 200I
claims 390 watts for 150 litres of water so 9.36KW
it takes 1.16 watts per cubic metre x .15 x 50 litres so 8.7KW
So this model has a COP of 0.93 !!!!
And that is using the information from their web site ......

I've no idea what you're doing with your calculation there, but you've got it wrong - you need to be working in kWh not kW when calculating heat input needed to raise the temperature of a volume of water.

8.7kWh is the energy required to heat 150l of water by 50 degrees, which I assume is what you were saying.

You can't actually get from that figure to the COP figure without knowing both the electrical input wattage, and the time taken to heat the 150l at that wattage of electrical input, and as far as I can see they don't give the time figures.

Assuming their figures are correct though, they give an electrical input range of 390-550 w, and a heat output range of 1690-2900 w.

The COP can be worked out from these figures as being a minimum of (1690/550) = 3.07


Working that backwards from the 8.7kWh heating requirement for 150l heated by 50 degrees, at the worst case of 1690W of heat being supplied, it would take 5.14 hours to heat the tank fully. 550W maximum electrical input x 5.14 hours = 2.83kWh of electrical input for 8.7kWh of heat output, or again a COP of 3.07 using the manufacturers worst case figures.

It's one thing stating that Energie should be supplying proper performance figures for their units at different external air temps, as is required for heat pumps - I'd agree with that, but it's just making the situation worse to start bandying around figures that seem to have been plucked from thin air, and bare no relation to the actual figures that are published, or any sort of understanding of how heat pumps actually work.

- - - Updated - - -

Surely they must be WRAS approved to get in the country and for companies to register them

they have the WRAS logo on their website, so I assume they must be WRAS compliant.

 

[sedgy34]

There seems to be more problems than benefits with these,

 

[wazzer]

Anything that is used with water has to be WRAS reg

 

[solarfred]

See entry here. http://www.wras.co.uk/Directory/Company_list_new.asp
This appears to be for one model being stainless steel cylinder. The regulations require a legionnella prevention system but on this unit I understand this is only achieved by manually turning on the immersion element as there is no automatic function. So does this comply?

 

[solarsavings]

Anything that is used with water has to be WRAS reg

You really should go and check that and you won't make the same mistake again.

 

[wazzer]

You really should go and check that and you won't make the same mistake again.

WRAS is an approval body which is able to verify compliance testing carried out by independent test laboratories. Upon successful verification WRAS are able to grant an approval which demonstrates that a product complies with the water supply (water fittings) Regulations 1999. Compliance with the water supply (water fittings) Regulations 1999 is a mandatory requirement for all products being installed in domestic water systems that may come into contact with potable water, ensuring the products can not affect the quality or taste of the water supply. No products should be installed within the UK that do not comply with these regulations.

 

[solarsavings]

Seriously, go away and check.

 

[Gavin A]

See entry here. http://www.wras.co.uk/Directory/Company_list_new.asp
This appears to be for one model being stainless steel cylinder. The regulations require a legionnella prevention system but on this unit I understand this is only achieved by manually turning on the immersion element as there is no automatic function. So does this comply?

1 - There are regulations relating to preheat systems, but this isn't a preheat system. http://www.wras.co.uk/Preheated-Water.htm

There are HSE regulations known as L8, which apply to non domestic settings, as well as recommendations for domestic solar water heating systems etc that could introduce Legionella risks, but they're not wras regulations, and are very much technology dependent in how they need to be applied.

2 - As this unit is supposed to be capable of heating the entire tank to the base to 53 deg in all weathers, and all legionella bacteria are killed off in water temperatures above 50 deg, there is no need for it to have a timed control on the immersion or any other Legionella control mechanism. This would be different if the unit were to be installed in a non-domestic setting where stricter L8 regs would apply, but for a domestic setting this unit should be absolutely fine without any need for additional legionella protection programme.

If the pre-heated water is stored at temperatures between 20[SUP]o[/SUP]C and 45[SUP]o[/SUP]C, which favours the growth of the Legionella bacteria, and large numbers of the bacteria develop, measures may be required to prevent these bacteria causing harm to health.

This isn't the case with these systems, which are capable of heating the entire tank to above 50deg, therefore no additional legionella control procedure is needed.

 

[zeljuga]

Legionella killed in minutes at 50 deg. And instantly at 60 deg C. All major cylinder manufacturers have option of heating cylinder once a day to 60 C to make sure no Legionella problem , as it likes temps. of 45`C and feeds on copper and plastic .

 

[Gavin A]

Legionella killed in minutes at 50 deg. And instantly at 60 deg C. All major cylinder manufacturers have option of heating cylinder once a day to 60 C to make sure no Legionella problem , as it likes temps. of 45`C and feeds on copper and plastic .

it's still not a problem as long as the tank temperature is above 50 degrees to the base though, as is the case here, so there's no requirements for any additional legionella control measures as standard, as is clear in the WRAS guidance I just quoted.

This whole heating the tank to the base once a day for an hour for domestic settings is a load of rubbish spread by the ex head of solartwin to discredit the rest of the solar thermal industry, it has no basis either in the legislation or in the science of legionella prevention - if it's already killed at 50 deg, then there's no point killing it again with a daily blast at 60deg.

 

[solarfred]

Thanks for the explanation. I was also just pointing out that the WRAS approval was for one model. I cannot see any reference to the manufacturer or other models but maybe it is just not obvious on the WRAS site.
These things are very popular in Ireland where WRAS does not exist.

 

[Gavin A]

I can't actually get that WRAS listing page to load up, but it could well be that the listing covers all the Energie tanks, as they're all the same design, it's just that they offer different size options on the same basic tank design.

alternatively you could be right and it's just listed for one of the size options, in which case there could be some slapped wrists or worse going on.

hard to know though as I can't load the page up.

 

[Gavin A]

I've found the listing now, and it does seem to only apply to the ECO280 model, whereas I'm sure it was the ECO250 model I was being sent prices for....

 

[stanwaterman]

I entirely agree with Gavin A, bandying about silly and totally wrong calculations is troublesome. These panels work just like any other heat-pump with a COP figure that depends on environmental factors but would rarely be less than 2 in a UK winter and often over 4 in the summer. These things are exactly he same as an air to air heat-pump with the external heat exchanger expanded, painted black and flattened out and the fan replaced by natural convection. They gain from being able to get heat from sun and rain but lose a bit from less efficient convective transfer from the air.
Nothing magic abut them- a good description would be "an environment to water heat-pump"

 

[Worcester]

They also benefit in having a direct to DHW condensor stage as opposed to going through an additional heat exchanger. so can make up some of the CoP in that way. They work, the problem is no-one will give real performance figures for the UK.

 

[stanwaterman]

If I could get one installed at a reasonable price, say about a £1,000, I'd be very happy to log it's every daily performance for a year!

 

[Gavin A]

we're just trying to sort out metering arrangements, then will have a couple of test units up and running over the rest of this winter - have the units in the warehouse, but the metering arrangements I'd been wanting to use turn out to cost nearly as much as the thermodynamic kit itself.

 

[wersolaruk]

we have about 4 systems installed and all are generating hot enough water all year for all our customers, so i can only speak of what these systems actually do and not some calculation. They do work, and hell of a lot better then solar thermal which is absolutely rubbish in my humble opinion

 

[MCS Renewables]

Despite asking at least three times we have yet to be sent reliable test evidence, reports etc by credible test labs such as TUV.

Thermodynamic manufacturers seem reluctant to publish any results at all and seem to just keep repeating the same old sales blurb.

As this technology costs considerably more than solar thermal, which is a proven technology and qualifies for the RHI and RHPP payments, I cannot see any benefit of promoting this technology until the MCS backs it.

Down our way the only companies promoting thermodynamics are the ones who do not fit PV or thermal, are not MCS registered and have fleets of shiny suited salesmen. These unregulated conmen are selling these systems for over £10K which would very nearly buy you two solar thermal systems.

 

[MCS Renewables]

Tom Callaghan director of the famous Simplee Solar, Staywarm, Energy Conservation Group and the Reds Technologies companies

They tell you solar panels are eco-friendly and save you money. The truth? They don't work much of the time and take 100 YEARS to pay for themselves... | Mail Online

Now runs ...

Green Home Energy

That sort of tells you all you need to know

 

[Gavin A]

As this technology costs considerably more than solar thermal, which is a proven technology and qualifies for the RHI and RHPP payments, I cannot see any benefit of promoting this technology until the MCS backs it.

1 - it doesn't
2 - new builds for developers don't qualify for RHI, and on a level playing field without subsidies I reckon thermodynamic panels win, particularly when used in conjunction with solar PV.

 

[MCS Renewables]

If solar thermodynamic is such a great product why are the manufacturers not getting proper testing done ?

Why did the manufacturers of thermodynamic panels originally need to con the MCS into getting approval ?

Why are thermodynamic modules still not MCS approved ?

Why are customers of this product complaining about the running cost on various forums ?

 

[Gavin A]

If solar thermodynamic is such a great product why are the manufacturers not getting proper testing done ?

because standard test facilities for ashp were inadequate for testing the panels as they don't include solar gain, or wind. I understand Narec now have a couple under test.

Why did the manufacturers of thermodynamic panels originally need to con the MCS into getting approval ?

MCS doesn't have a category into which they fit, is this the fault of the manufacturers or MCS for ignoring a product that was on the market before MCS existed?

Why are thermodynamic modules still not MCS approved ?

Because it's taken this long just to get a test procedure agreed, as originally MCS wanted to test them using standard ASHP tests which would entirely ignore the main benefits of the panels - ie no solar gain, no wind in the test procedures. (as I understand it).

Why are customers of this product complaining about the running cost on various forums ?

miss selling / bad installs probably, though it's also possible that some models might be implemented badly.

As I say, I view them as being best when matched with solar PV, where the majority of the electricity used could be from the solar if controlled in the right way.

I'll see how they work in practice soon enough though.

 

[MCS Renewables]

So just to be clear you are saying :

That this unproven and untested, non MCS approved product, which is manufactured by two companies based in Spain and Portugal and not made for the UK market , which costs £6k plus to install and qualifies for no RHI or RHPP payments and costs at least £10 a week to run and in your opinion needs pairing with a PV system

is a better system than ...

A Solar thermal system that costs £6K or less to install, very very little to run, and qualifies for around £4k in RHI and RHPP payments over the seven years and is a proven technology that has been installed for twenty or more years in the UK.


Do you also believe that West Ham will win the premiership and that Santa exists ?

 

[wersolaruk]

6k plus, are u on drugs pal? stop twisting like a kid, mcs this mcs that. we install it for 3k all in. its clearly not the product its the people selling it, as for the performance of thermal its crap, and there are a a lot more complaints about thermal panels struggling to hit 18 degrees after september, one customer has reported with a thermal dynamics that performance dipped in early december buts still measured at 18 degrees on around the 10th of december which i think is great. had boiling hot water rest of the year.

 

[MCS Renewables]

3K !!!!!!!

You must be the cheapest people in the country , some of the companies near me are over 10K and still promising the RHI , the cheapest anywhere near us is £6995

 

[solarsavings]

Why are customers of this product complaining about the running cost on various forums ?

Do you have a link please.

 

[wersolaruk]

well they are ripping people off simple as, takes no more than a day to install, fgas engineer to regulate the panel side, and a standard plumber to pipe the cylinder up. radial circuit to feed the immersion probes and thats it, no mcs no bull crap that you have to do with pv. installer can still walk away with £1000 profit for a days work in and around a pv install is ok for us.

 

[Gavin A]

3K !!!!!!!

You must be the cheapest people in the country , some of the companies near me are over 10K and still promising the RHI , the cheapest anywhere near us is £6995

as I said, the problem is miss selling. Do you also think that solar PV is a bad technology because there are companies out there selling it for £14k and promising returns based on misleading data? or is that ok because MCS say it's ok?

£3k is about right for direct to the installer sales, obviously it will be more if the sales guy / company is wanting several grand off the sale.

 

[MCS Renewables]

a Do you also think that solar PV is a bad technology because there are companies out there selling it for £14k and promising returns based on misleading data? or is that ok because MCS say it's ok?

No but PV manufacturers have tested products that are approved, the same with solar thermal products and heat pumps, biomass boilers and wind turbines.
Independent testing has been undertaken on all of the above products and the results are clear and verifiable.

Solar thermodynamics is the only product I know that tried to con the MCS system by "painting stripes on a horse and calling it a zebra".
It is the only product that does not publish verifiable data and COP figures from testing.

 

[Gavin A]

So just to be clear you are saying :

That this unproven and untested, non MCS approved product, which is manufactured by two companies based in Spain and Portugal and not made for the UK market , which costs £6k plus to install and qualifies for no RHI or RHPP payments and costs at least £10 a week to run and in your opinion needs pairing with a PV system

where have you plucked that £10 a week figure from? Most houses could heat their water from straight immersions for less than that. Even if the average COP was as low as 2 that'd give costs of around £200 a year, but while the COP in winter may be that sort of level, there's no reason why it would be the rest of the year as long as it was timed to run mostly in daylight hours.

Without solar PV it'd not be worth retrofitting to houses on mains gas, but probably would for full electric houses.

With solar PV though most of the energy used would be from the solar generation, so the costs would be pretty minimal.

Ais a better system than ...

A Solar thermal system that costs £6K or less to install, very very little to run, and qualifies for around £4k in RHI and RHPP payments over the seven years and is a proven technology that has been installed for twenty or more years in the UK.

I see you missed the bit where I mentioned new builds and the fact they don't qualify for RHI anyway.

Factor the lack of RHI in, then consider that there is no need to supply a back up heat source, thereby reducing the size and cost of the boiler, and knocking a day or 2 of plumbing and the associated costs of pipes, valve etc from the overall costs of the work, and that around 40% of the hot water demand would need to be met from gas boiler on a standard solar water heating system...

In this situation I don't see that there's going to be much in it in running cost terms, and if there is solar PV to supply most of the power, then IMO the equation is likely to come out in favor of the thermodynamic option if it's controlled to ensure most of the use is when there's excess solar PV generation.

Basically these units are just heat pumps, and should be generally more efficient on average than most ashp due to the additional heat input of the solar gain, so arguments about its suitability for water heating should apply more to ASHP than they do to the thermodynamic systems due to the higher input temperatures when solar gain applies.

Do you also believe that West Ham will win the premiership and that Santa exists ?

No, but I do understand the physics behind heat pumps.

 

[Gavin A]

No but PV manufacturers have tested products that are approved, the same with solar thermal products and heat pumps, biomass boilers and wind turbines.
Independent testing has been undertaken on all of the above products and the results are clear and verifiable.

Solar thermodynamics is the only product I know that tried to con the MCS system by "painting stripes on a horse and calling it a zebra".
It is the only product that does not publish verifiable data and COP figures from testing.

it was also the only product that MCS / DECC hadn't seen fit to create a suitable category for when they were setting all these schemes up. That isn't down to there being anything inherently wrong with the technology, it's more that it's a relatively new technology that didn't have any UK trade body representation at the time this was all getting sorted out.

 

[wersolaruk]

well said gavin my thoughts exactly its a technology that stands completely on it own. in oil situations this can be a incredible investment , not so much on combi gas boiler install. I am going to pop one in my house to do my hot water requirements, just for the crack really see exactly how they do.

 

[solarsavings]

Do you have a link please.

MCS I think it important that you provide a link to those moaning about the running costs as google isn't being very helpful.

 

[MCS Renewables]

Check the Irish and ex pat Portugese Forums.

Loads and loads of issues, problems, lack of trust in product, lack of reliable data peoples electricity bills going up etc etc.
Too many to list .....

Flat plate solar collector v Thermodynamic solar collector - boards.ie

News: Thermodynamic solar/anytime panels - boards.ie

Beware of Thermodynamic Panels ? | Silver Spray

 

[solarsavings]

Mcs I've read all of the links you gave and couldn't find anyone who had had them installed complaining about the running cost. The link did show that people without any experience of the system are claiming they can't work.

 

[wersolaruk]

I am sorry MCS them links are rubbish, again its people throwing ideas from pillar to post. no one of them people have them actually installed and most of the comments they don't even give relevant answers to how the system actually works at all, just a educated answers based on false information. I can give you 5 numbers of customers who i have installed for and the feed back is brilliant, they all have solar pv installed. I think you need to stop trailing forums were most peoples heads are full of cartoons walt disney couldn't write and actually install one you maybe in for a shock.

 

[Gavin A]

Check the Irish and ex pat Portugese Forums.

Loads and loads of issues, problems, lack of trust in product, lack of reliable data peoples electricity bills going up etc etc.
Too many to list .....

Flat plate solar collector v Thermodynamic solar collector - boards.ie

News: Thermodynamic solar/anytime panels - boards.ie

Beware of Thermodynamic Panels ? | Silver Spray


View attachment 22251

I read about 25 pages of various threads and about the only complaint seemed to be one with energy use so far off the scale that there must have been something seriously wrong with the installation.

On the other hand there seem to be several well satisfied customers including a couple who've been posting real world electricity consumption figures, with over a years worth of data from Ireland at this link showing weekly electricity consumption varying from 17-23kWh over most of the year, peaking at 33kWh for a single week listed as being below zero for 5 nights. I think that data is for a house of 4 people, with the hot water temperature set to 55 degrees.

I have two friends at work who have installed the thermodynamic system. One was installed about four weeks ago. The other was installed about nine weeks ago. He has got his bi monthly electricity bill. He says these are rough figures, i think it was an estimated bill aswell. His average bill is usually about 150 and this bill was 176. I know we cant judge anything by this. I am trying to encourage him to buy a watt meter.

that'd be a EUR26 rise in electricity bill over a 9 week period = ~EUR2.90 a week, which seems a lot different to your £10 a week figure.

and a few more quotes from the threads linked to

Attached is the latest data for the system.
As everyone knows the weather has been very cold all through March and April and now May isn't much better.
No complaints from any of the family so far and happy with the ESB bill.

Well, we have the panels installed a week now and so far we are delighted with them.

The report quotes an “Energie” thermodynamic system consuming 4.1 kWh of electricity to heat 250 litres of water from 10°C to 55°C with 15°C ambient temp. The 2.7 COP is “no better, financially or environmentally, than a modern gas boiler).

a COP of 2.7 for heating water to 55 degrees with ambient air temperature of 15degC is at least on par with decent quality ashp. Using data from panasonic ASHP tables, that should be improved by about 0.3 to a COP of 3.0 ish if the temperature of the tank was lowered to 50 degrees.

I also like this bit at the end of the silver spray article

So if Thermodynamic panels can have a good chunk of their winter electricity from the PV panels, they could still be the best solution.

let's just do a quick comparison between an all electric heated situation with solar water heating vs a retrofit thremodynamic system...

60% solar water heating
40% electricity at COP of 1:!
= 40% of electrical input to annual heat generated, equivalent to an annual performance COP of 2.5 (excluding electricity used to power pumps etc)

100% thermodynamic would therefore need to have an average COP of 2.5 through the year to work out better than SWH + immersion - as an average across the year that looks about achievable just based on standard ASHP type COPs alone, add in the solar gain though and it should raise that average COP significantly.

Add in solar PV and the situation changes dramatically as the immersion would largely be drawing power when no sun was available, whereas the thermodynamic system would largely be drawing solar PV generated electricity that would otherwise be exported throughout the year.

 

[Gavin A]

ps there was also a complaint on there about a badly performing ground source heat pump install that was costing a fortune to run, diagnosed as being down to a poor installation method running a buffer tank at 55 degrees then running the heating off that.

so being an MCS certified technology is obviously no guarantee of their not being complaints about badly installed systems underperforming.

There was some interesting analysis from a refrigeration engineer querying how well the compressors would deal with the varying input and output temperatures and what the impact would be on lifespan. In the entire threads that was about the only actual genuine issue I picked up on that could really be seen as calling the technology itself into question, I suppose it's a bit early to tell how much of an issue this will be, but as he was more concerned about the high end panel temperatures, I'd say that the fact these systems have been used the longest in Portugal should count in their favor on that point.

 

[SilverSpray]

I'm the chap behind the Silver Spray web site.
I've been following / researching Themodynamic Panels for about 2 years.
My blog site has lots of posts about them. Most are positive, and my conclusion is that I am going to install them on my rebuild project.

 

[Worcester]

well they are ripping people off simple as, takes no more than a day to install, fgas engineer to regulate the panel side, and a standard plumber to pipe the cylinder up. radial circuit to feed the immersion probes and thats it, no mcs no bull crap that you have to do with pv. installer can still walk away with £1000 profit for a days work in and around a pv install is ok for us.

@wersolaruk - are you not installing unvented cylinders then? Are you upgrading the standard kit to meet G3?
It's difficult enough to replace a vented cylinder with an unvented one in a day let alone also install the panel and piping.. (it took a whole day on one job just to plumb in the D2...) - how big a team are you using to install in one day?

The Solar Thermal systems we install perform well (very well in some cases) and are a proven, tried and tested product which we can predict the output of reasonably accurately - using the right controls (boiler interlock) and stratified Solar Thermal cylinders with dedicated solar volumes makes a heap of difference.

I'm not against thermodynamics, the principle makes sense, however with no defrost cycle, and no UK CoP figures, it is very difficult to come up with any real output figures.

we're just trying to sort out metering arrangements, then will have a couple of test units up and running over the rest of this winter - have the units in the warehouse, but the metering arrangements I'd been wanting to use turn out to cost nearly as much as the thermodynamic kit itself.

Gavin - will you be able to do metering to the RHI requirements? or because the condensor is the DHW primary will you only be able to measure inputs (electrical) and outputs - consumed DHW? - these meters are cost effective: We are Heat Meter Suppliers in the UK. We Offer a Wide Range of Different Suppliers All Across Europe - DMS Limited offers a wide range of products. (tell Chris I sent you )

 

[Gavin A]

Gavin - will you be able to do metering to the RHI requirements? or because the condensor is the DHW primary will you only be able to measure inputs (electrical) and outputs - consumed DHW? - these meters are cost effective: We are Heat Meter Suppliers in the UK. We Offer a Wide Range of Different Suppliers All Across Europe - DMS Limited offers a wide range of products. (tell Chris I sent you )

cheers for the link, but I need to monitor electrical consumption at the same time, and was also wanting to monitor solar irradiance, air temperature and wind speed.

I have the ability to do most of that already, just not to be able to data log it all in the same data logger.

Well, I might have, just need to find time to try to cobble it all together, and it involves removing the kit from our solar water heating system.

Should have it installed in the next few weeks I hope, got to get it in for at least part of the winter.