So you’ve seen Will’s solar home and are inspired?

(Will, we’re really glad you’re chuffed with your new mini power station).

The UK’s newly announced Feed-in tariff brings a new dawn for generating electricity with solar power in the UK. The new scheme means homeowners producing solar electricity will earn income from energy generation, benefit from significant savings on electricity bills and cut carbon emissions. It’s estimated that you can save and earn over £1,000 per year for 25 years, increasing with inflation, with a typical solar electric system.  Because of this, the Government hopes one in every ten homes will be solar by 2020.

So what next?

Check out your roof. It will need to be up to it, meaning not caving in with significant structural problems. As long as it’s not north facing or shaded for most of the day, you’re likely to be able to consider going solar.  

I remember when generating electricity from the sun seemed closer to science fiction fantasy than a realistic and practical means of micro-energy generation. That was up until yesterday; when I became another homeowner in the UK with the capacity to generate green electricity from an otherwise very ordinary rooftop. 

The refurbishment is well underway at our house in Bristol, which will make it the 10:10 and Great British Refurb Campaign's Home of the Future. 

A notable change so far has been the arrival of vast quantities of Knauf Insulation.

How do you start an eco refurb? As you mean to continue of course: with lofty environmental intentions.

In my case that means stripping out my home’s old fixtures and putting in steel joists and columns to improve its efficiency and circulation, and future proof it (more on that later).

We're really excited about the work starting now; we still couldn't quite believe all the refurbishments were really going to be happening until the builders arrived earlier this week and made a start on things. They plan to be here for 4 weeks, and in that time install extensive insulation, draft exclusion and solar voltaics. Needless to say we've had some sleepless nights in anticipation, thinking over the scale of the changes to come. Catherine and I have been moved into a very nice apartment near-by our house while the messiest part of the work is underway. Amongst other things our kitchen and bathroom is being completely removed to allow for the internal wall insulation to be fitted. After spending our first winter in our 130-year-old house, we're really excited about the heat savings these changes will make.
Meeting with campaign related press was a bit daunting but I'm pleased to say so far the TV, radio and newspaper journalists have all been very friendly and interested to see what's going on.

It's all good preparation for the Ecobuild conference in London next month, where I'll be talking about the refurbishment experience at Earls Court.

It's taken some time to realise that I don't like to make things easy for myself - but I do like to make things right. A year ago we moved into a detached 1960s four-bedroom house in Brighton. Hardly the designer home one might expect for a man, who enthuses about good sustainable design on TV, but it took a year and a half to find this ugly house on a nice street and I really believe this 1960s-style house offers us a golden eco-friendly opportunity.
On the plus side it's something of a Tardis. Small on the outside but roomy inside, its large windows make it lovely and light, and it has a generous plot size in a great central Brighton location.

On the downside, it's both characterless and woefully energy inefficient; lacking in roof, wall and floor insulation, and filled with outdated wasteful boilers, appliances, taps and toilets.
But it could very easily become the house of the future: efficient to run and low in CO2 emissions, but also nurturing, and personal – a good home to live in and a great place to bring up my children.

Are you someone who likes the idea of generating your electricity, but just not ready to take the plunge?

Well, you're not alone. But if you've been thinking about solar for a while, now might be the time to look a bit further..Did you know that from now until April of 2010, homeowners can take advantage of two overlapping Government incentives encouraging people to generate their own electricity?  Households that install a solar PV system in this time will be able to get their hands on a grant of up to £2,500 and also benefit from £1,000 a year when the “clean energy cash back” scheme, announced in the recent Government consultation paper, is launched.