Thanks for the posts of the last couple of days-we are currently building and your posts have got me doing more reading. I noticed that there was a lot of discussion of replacement panels no longer being eligible for RECs- seems that this would mean it would be now more economical to buy quality up front rather than expecting to replace "lesser" panels down the track
What's a lesser panel? The biggest trouble I had when deciding upon my choice of panel was neither REC nor warranty, it was simply how to pick a good panel. Price has nothing to do with it. There are cheap Chinese panels that work well with no more indication of "shoddiness" than the expensive panels.
When I was purchasing my 30kW worth of panels, I came to the conclusion that the initial manufacturing warranty had some value (only as good as the company that you buy from however) and that the 25year output warranty was valueless as how does one prove a less than 80% output on a 25 year old panel? It would require NATA testing. That testing would likely cost more than the panels are worth and even then, you are still at the mercy of trying to claim against an international warranty in a foreign country. Good luck with that. The Chubb warranty (which was regularly claimed to be a silver bullet against all issues) was not even applicable to end-user residential type installations and meant basically nothing.
The RECs were (and still are) important, but to be honest, I didn't think a faulty panel replacement would receive a new lot of RECs as the initial REC calculation was not fulfilled and the replacement would be exactly that, no more RECs regardless.
My decision came down to price, research and a calculated gamble. Simple as that. I was speaking to a well know solar distributor/installer and he was desperately trying to sell me "his" preferred brand (supposedly European made) as they were far superior to any "lucky Dragon" panels. That was his favourite term to describe Chinese panels and in his infinite wisdom, there was no such thing as good Chinese product. At that stage I had been dealing in Chinese electrical products for a number of years and I had learned there was the complete gamut of quality available out of China, from absolute cough to really good stuff. The problem was how to work out which were which with solar panels. I had been quoted (from memory) about $1.60/W for the non-lucky-dragon panels and I have no doubt they were quality panels (which however, could still fail and need the warranty), as opposed to the ones I finally chose which were BLD at about $0.53/W which had a potential saving to me of about $32 000. I researched BLD. In Europe, they were sold as quality European panels ... no they weren't, they were Chinese, but hey, why let the truth stand in the way of a good sales pitch! At that point, they had been sold in Europe and Great Britain for about 5 years and I could not find any negative comment about them anywhere. I decided that it was worth the risk to spend the $16 000 and see how they go. It was a gamble, no doubt.
The guy I mentioned previously was scathing in his comments on line about me, even bringing in personal insults with regard to myself, my career and my knowledge, regardless of the fact he essentially did not know me. The really amusing part is, not long after, he started to import and sell "lucky-dragon" cough himself and justified it as being quality because he had personally tested it on his "wall of death"! His testing consisted of buying a product, overdriving it way beyond all it's specs and if it didn't smoke up, it must be quality gear!
He appeared to quite genuinely believe that was a sound method of testing, but the desperation shown made me actually quite relieved I didn't listen to his hyperbole to start with!
I have no idea if my panels will actually last in excess of 25 years, but 5 years in without any failure of panels, no visible degradation and an output possibly a bit better than I had expected, is comforting.