Where we work
Solar panels in Cheshire and North WalesSolar, batteries and EV chargers across Cheshire.
Cheshire is home ground: we are based in Ellesmere Port, seven miles from Chester, and we fit solar panels across the county and over the border into North Wales at Wrexham and Mold, where the planning rules are Welsh.
Cheshire
Every town we cover here.
Straight-line distance from our base in Ellesmere Port, nearest first.
- Ellesmere Port under 2 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Helsby 6 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Neston 6 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Chester 7 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Frodsham 8 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Runcorn 8 miles Halton · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Widnes 9 miles Halton · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Mold 13 miles Flintshire · Wales · battery storage · EV chargers
- Tarporley 13 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Warrington 15 miles Warrington · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Northwich 17 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Winsford 17 miles Cheshire West and Chester · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Wrexham 17 miles Wrexham · Wales · battery storage · EV chargers
- Middlewich 20 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Nantwich 22 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Knutsford 22 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Crewe 24 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Sandbach 25 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Wilmslow 28 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Congleton 30 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
- Macclesfield 32 miles Cheshire East · England · battery storage · EV chargers
The roof studio
Turn the house, fill the roof.
A Cheshire semi on a turntable. Drag it round, then tell it about your roof and your house — the panels, the battery, the current running through it and the numbers all move together.
01Your roof
02Your house
Estimated generation
3,870
kWh a year
Estimated saving
£834
a year, saved and earned
Estimated payback
10.1
years
System size
4.40 kWp
Panels
10
Your use covered
58%
Of what the roof generates
Worked out for a typical Cheshire roof at the pitch and aspect you picked, on a unit rate of 28p and an export rate of 6.5p — rates this tool assumes, dated September 2026, rather than any tariff you have been offered. Nothing here is a quotation: your roof, your shading and how much electricity you use while the sun is up are what the survey settles.
Take the figures with you.
Copy what the studio worked out for your roof, or send it straight to us with a survey request. None of it is a quote: the survey replaces every figure above with your own.
Every assumption behind the numbers
- Unit rate
- 28p for every unit (kWh) you’d otherwise buy from the grid.
- Export rate
- 6.5p for every unit the house and battery can’t use and send back to the grid.
- Your yearly use
- Worked out from your monthly bill at the 28p unit rate, after a standing charge of about 36p a day — and never less than 1,100 kWh a year.
- What a panel makes
- Each panel is 440 W (0.44 kWp). A kWp makes 880 kWh a year facing south, 760 facing east–west and 620 facing north-ish. For this part of Cheshire the EU’s PVGIS model gives 951 for a south roof at a typical pitch — the studio stays below it.
- Pitch
- Shallow (28°) makes 95% of a typical 38° roof; steep (48°) makes 97%.
- Shading
- A bit of shade costs 10%; heavy shade costs 24%.
- How many panels
- Two rows, growing with your bill from three columns to eight — six panels up to sixteen.
- How much you use yourself
- The share of what the roof makes that the house uses: 30% if you’re usually out, 46% in and out, 62% usually home. A battery adds 24 points and a car charger 6, up to 86% — and never more than 62% of your whole year’s use.
- Saving
- The units you use yourself at 28p, plus the units you export at 6.5p.
- Payback
- The yearly saving set against what a system like the one you’ve built typically costs to install: a base figure, an amount for each panel, and more again for a battery or a charger. The answer is held between 4 and 25 years. The studio never shows that cost, because only a survey can price your roof — so treat the years as a rough guide, not a figure to hold us to.
Monthly and yearly sunshine for this area: PVGIS 5.2, EU Joint Research Centre. The unit rate, the export rate and the standing charge are the studio’s own assumptions, set in September 2026 — not a tariff we have quoted you. Your own rates are on your bill, and a survey works from those.
The coverage map
Cheshire on the map.
The wires
Who runs the network here.
Which distribution network you sit on decides who signs off the connection, and on what terms.
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Chester, Ellesmere Port, Neston, Helsby, Frodsham, Runcorn, Widnes, Northwich, Winsford, Tarporley, Middlewich, Knutsford, Crewe, Nantwich and Sandbach are all inside SP Energy Networks’ SP Manweb licence area — the network SPEN describes as the operator “for North Wales, Merseyside, Cheshire and North Shropshire”.
spenergynetworks.opendatasoft.com -
SP Energy Networks takes a G98 notification for a single generator under 16A per phase (3.68kW) “before or at the time of commissioning”, and the commissioning confirmation “must be completed and submitted to us within 30 days of commissioning”. Above that threshold the connection has to comply with G99.
spenergynetworks.co.uk · spenergynetworks.co.uk -
The east of the county is not SPEN. Macclesfield is on SP Electricity North West, as is Wilmslow bar a handful of homes on its south-western edge that fall in SP Manweb’s area. Warrington is split too: most of the town, including the centre, is on SP Manweb, while Birchwood is served by SP Electricity North West.
spenergynetworks.opendatasoft.com · electricitynorthwest.opendatasoft.com -
Congleton is the one place on this page with no network named. It sits on the edge of SP Energy Networks’ area, outside both operators’ open data at the town centre, so the honest answer is to check the distributor ID in the MPAN on the bill, or call 105.
spenergynetworks.opendatasoft.com · energynetworks.org
Every install is notified to that operator — how G98 and G99 work.
Planning
What the planning rules say here.
Most domestic solar is permitted development, with conditions — and the conditions are not identical on both sides of the border.
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Rooftop solar on a house in England is permitted development under Part 14, Class A of the GPDO 2015. On the text as amended on 27 August 2026, panels on a pitched roof may protrude no more than 0.2 metres and may not rise above the highest part of the roof, chimneys excluded; on a flat roof the limit is 0.6 metres.
legislation.gov.uk · legislation.gov.uk -
Wrexham and Mold are in Wales, where the rules are separate and England’s 27 August 2026 amendment does not apply. Welsh flat-roof panels may not sit “within 1 metre of the external edge of the roof” or “protrude more than 1 metre above the plane of the roof”, and on a wall or pitched roof they “should project no more than 200mm from the roof or wall surface”.
gov.wales
If your roof is listed, flat or in a conservation area, say so on the first call — it changes the design, not the answer. When solar panels need planning permission, and how panels go on a flat roof.
Council schemes
Council solar schemes in Cheshire.
A search for solar here turns up council-backed group buys as well as installers. They are run by the councils, not by us — this is how each one works.
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Solar Together Cheshire and Warrington. Cheshire West and Chester, Cheshire East and Warrington councils run a group-buying scheme with iChoosr. Registering is free and carries no obligation; approved installers then bid in a reverse auction, and each household is emailed a personal recommendation before a technical survey. Panels come with optional battery storage and EV charge points, and homes that already have panels can buy a battery on its own. The scheme has run in rounds — the council describes it as having reopened — so check whether registration is open now.
participatenow.cheshirewestandchester.gov.uk -
Switch Together. The same scheme under its current name: iChoosr now trades it as Switch Together, “formerly known as Solar Together”, with a Cheshire West and Chester page for solar and battery storage and another for a battery alone.
switchtogether.co.uk
Whichever route you take, ask for MCS certification — the Smart Export Guarantee depends on it — and for the network notification to be handled for you. How a direct install runs.
Planning authorities
Who decides planning in Cheshire.
6 authorities cover the towns on this page. Each one publishes its own conservation-area map — worth a look before anything goes on a front elevation.
- Cheshire West and Chester Councilcheshirewestandchester.gov.uk
- Cheshire East Councilcheshireeast.gov.uk
- Halton Borough Councilhalton.gov.uk
- Warrington Borough Councilwarrington.gov.uk
- Wrexham County Borough Councilwrexham.gov.uk
- Flintshire County Councilflintshire.gov.uk
Cheshire · questions
What people ask about Cheshire.
If yours isn’t here, give us a ring and ask, or see every question.
For most of the county it is SP Energy Networks, through SP Manweb. The east is the exception: Macclesfield and nearly all of Wilmslow belong to SP Electricity North West, and Warrington is divided between the two. For any one house the MPAN on your electricity bill settles it — a distributor ID of 13 means SP Manweb, 16 means SP Electricity North West.
Usually not. In England a rooftop array on a house is normally permitted development, provided the panels stand at most 0.2 metres proud of a pitched roof and stay below its highest point. Two things change that: a listed house has no such rights, and in a conservation area a flat-roof array needs prior approval of its appearance, with nothing on a wall, balcony or roof enclosure facing a highway. Cheshire West and Chester has 96 conservation areas and Cheshire East 76, so the council’s map is worth checking before the survey.
Yes. Wales sets its own permitted development rules, so England’s August 2026 changes stop at the border. On a Welsh house, panels on a pitched roof or a wall should stand out 200mm at most and stay below the ridgeline, and a flat-roof array keeps a metre back from the edge and no higher than a metre above the roof. In a conservation area, panels on a principal or side wall seen from the highway need consent, and Cadw’s Cof Cymru shows whether a house is listed.
Seven miles as the crow flies from Ellesmere Port, where we are based, which makes it one of the closest towns we cover: besides Ellesmere Port itself, only Helsby and Neston, at six miles, are nearer. At the far end of the county, Wilmslow, Congleton and Macclesfield are 28 to 32 miles out.
One of six, depending on the town. Cheshire West and Chester covers Chester, Northwich, Winsford, Tarporley, Frodsham, Helsby, Neston and Ellesmere Port; Halton covers Runcorn and Widnes; Warrington has its own borough council; and Cheshire East covers Crewe, Nantwich, Sandbach, Middlewich, Knutsford, Wilmslow, Macclesfield and Congleton. Over the Welsh border, Mold comes under Flintshire and Wrexham under Wrexham County Borough.
It comes down to who you want choosing. Solar Together pools everyone who registers and lets approved installers bid for the group, so the auction sets the price and decides which firm turns up. Going direct, you pick the firm, talk the design through with the people who will fit it, and can ask for a particular battery or charger. Whichever you choose, check the installer is MCS certified and that the network operator gets told about the system.
There is no Cheshire price, because nothing in the cost is tied to the postcode. It follows the roof and the kit: how many panels fit, the pitch, which way the slopes face, what the scaffold has to reach, whether a battery goes in, and whether the system is big enough to need a G99 application. The roof studio on our home page models a system against your own electricity bill, and a survey of the house then turns that into a quote.
Data last reviewed: September 2026.
From the Google profile
What people say after we have been.
4 of our 39 Google reviews, word for word. The rest are on the reviews page.
The work itself
Three of our own roofs.
Finished arrays from our own jobs.
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Panels set square on a concrete-tile roof -
A long row of panels on a concrete-tile roof -
An array above a first-floor balcony on a tiled roof
What we do here
Solar panels, batteries and car chargers in Cheshire and North Wales.
Start here
Start with a conversation, not a quote.
Tell us the postcode and roughly what you use. We’ll tell you honestly whether the roof is worth doing — and if it isn’t, that’s a perfectly good answer too.
- Takes about a minute
- You get a person, not a brochure
- No obligation, and no visit until you ask for one