Solar and battery storage for homes
Designed from your electricity bill rather than picked from a menu.
Solar panel installers in Manchester
Solar, battery storage and servicing for homes and businesses across Manchester and Greater Manchester. A lot of inner Manchester's housing is terraced, with slate roofs and a roofline shared with next door, so we design from a survey of your roof, not an aerial photo.
Where we work
We cover Manchester and the surrounding boroughs day to day: Salford, Trafford, Stockport, Tameside, Oldham, Rochdale, Bury and Bolton.
We are based in Warrington, about 40 minutes away on a normal morning. If you are not sure whether we cover you, ring and ask rather than filling in a form. We will tell you straight away.
What Manchester roofs are actually like
Terraces and back-to-backs. A lot of inner Manchester housing shares a roofline with the neighbours, which affects scaffolding, access and where the inverter can sensibly go. It also means your roof may have less usable unshaded area than the aerial view suggests. We survey for that rather than assuming.
Victorian slate. Older slate roofs need different fixings to modern concrete tile, and some need attention before an array goes on them. There is no sense fitting a twenty-five year system to a roof with a few years left in it, and we will tell you if that is what we find.
Conservation areas and listed buildings. Manchester has a lot of both. Domestic rooftop solar is usually permitted development, but the position changes on a listed building and can change in a conservation area, particularly on an elevation facing a highway. We check before designing anything.
Apartment and accommodation blocks. These are a different job again: freeholder consent, shared supplies, and a metering arrangement that has to be worked out before anything else. We do this work, and the first conversation is usually with the managing agent rather than a resident.
What we do here
Battery retrofits
Very common in Manchester, where a lot of arrays went on under the old Feed-in Tariff and came with no storage at all.
Commercial solar
For warehouses, industrial units and offices, including the older industrial stock around the city.
Servicing, cleaning and bird proofing
Including on systems we did not install and systems whose installer has gone out of business.
What it costs in Manchester
Most home installations we quote land between £5,995 and £8,995 installed, including VAT at 0%. Adding a battery to panels you already have typically costs £2,800 to £5,000.
In Manchester the house matters more than the postcode. A mid-terrace with a shared roofline, an older slate roof or an original fuse board can each add to the job, and we tell you which apply after the survey.
What moves the price
| Factor | What it means here |
|---|---|
| Terraces and shared rooflines | Scaffolding has to be agreed around the neighbours and the street. It is normally included in our price and typically accounts for £500 to £1,000 of it |
| Victorian slate | Slate needs different fixings to concrete tile, and an older roof may need repairs first. We tell you before you commit |
| Older consumer units | Common in older housing, and sometimes need upgrading before a system can be connected |
| A battery | Adds £2,800 to £5,000, depending on capacity |
You get a fixed written quote after a survey. The price on the quote is the price you pay. How our pricing works
Grid connection in Manchester
How grid approval worksYour distribution network operator is Electricity North West. They are the company that owns the wires, and they are not your energy supplier.
We deal with them on your behalf as part of every job: the notification for a straightforward domestic system, or the full application and approval for anything larger, including most solar-plus-battery combinations.
If you let a house in Manchester
A large share of Manchester's homes are privately rented, and the rules for landlords are changing. The government has confirmed that every private tenancy in England and Wales will need to meet a higher energy standard by 1 October 2030.
The new standard comes in two parts. The fabric of the home comes first, meaning insulation and similar work. After that the landlord chooses one of two routes: a heating standard, usually met with a heat pump, or a smart readiness standard, met with measures such as solar panels, a battery and a smart meter.
The spend a landlord can be required to make is capped at £10,000 per property, and a home already rated EPC C before 1 October 2029 counts as compliant until that certificate expires. Work done from 1 October 2025 can count towards the cap.
For many terraces and semis, solar and a battery is the cheaper route because it leaves a working boiler alone, and the tenant gets the lower bills. We can price that route for a single house or a portfolio, and we will tell you if your property would be better served by something else.
Questions from Manchester customers
Who installs and services solar panels in Manchester?
DB Energy installs solar panels and batteries, and services existing systems, including ones another firm fitted, for homes and businesses anywhere in Greater Manchester. We are based in Warrington and take work anywhere in the UK. We are MCS certified (NIC-601172) and a RECC member (00075024).
Can you fit solar panels on a Manchester terrace that shares a roof with next door?
Usually, yes. The panels go on your own part of the roof, and the survey checks how much of it is really unshaded once chimney stacks and the neighbouring roofs are taken into account. Scaffolding often has to run along the neighbours' frontage too, so we agree it with them before the job is booked.
Does my Manchester rental need solar panels for the 2030 standard?
Not necessarily. In January 2026 the government set out a higher standard for private rentals in England and Wales from 1 October 2030: insulation first, then either a heating route or a smart route that solar and a battery can count towards. It still has to become law, and until it does the legal minimum stays at EPC E. We can price the solar route for one house or several.
Do I need permission from Electricity North West for solar or a battery?
It depends on size. If the inverters total 3.68kW or less on a normal single-phase supply, we notify Electricity North West within 28 days of switching the system on. Larger systems need an application and their go-ahead before they are connected, and we make that application for you.
Send a photo of your roof
Send a photo of the roof from the street, and if it is a terrace, get next door's roof in too. With a recent bill, that is enough for us to say what would fit and whether it is worth doing.