PLACING high-tech solar panels on your roof to power your home and create a surplus for your neighbours to use sounds like a money-saving and altruistic project.

But although architect Varda Sarnat, who was the first person in Camden to install panels under a green deal scheme seven years ago, has been powering her Parliament Hill Fields home and selling electricity to power suppliers EDF, she has yet to receive any of the promised fees in return.

She says EDF have ignored the deal they struck with her and for seven years have stonewalled her attempts to get a token payment for the power generated. 

Ms Sarnat studied at the Architecture Association and during her career has researched sustainable technology in buildings. 

The solar panels in Glenhurst Avenue

She has built homes in the remote and harsh environment of Galilei Desert in Israel, which required particular techniques.

“I have researched building homes in two climates and have a background in how to make a home work,” she said. “So when I heard of the scheme to encourage homeowners to install solar panels, cut their own electricity bills and sell power to the grid to help produce green energy, I thought I would try it out.”

She received grants and invested her own money to install six panels costing £10,000 in her Glenhurst Avenue house. They have worked efficiently, and she has a meter that measures how much extra output she has fed to EDF.  

She says: “Build­ing a house is like building a machine. It should sustain itself. And you’d be surprised how straightforward it is to produce your own energy.”

Her solar panels use wafer-thin “mono cells” that produce electrons. They transform light into electricity to be used in the home, and the surplus is sent into the national grid.

But because Ms Sarnat was a pioneer, the system that should have been in place to ensure power supplier EDF paid her for the electricity generated – a key part of the policy to encourage micro generation – had not been used before.

“They told me I was the first in Camden to install solar panels on the roof and they came and visited my house to see it all in place,” she says. “I signed a contract with EDF but I asked them to sort out the paperwork as I thought they would have a system in place,” she says.

“They take my electricity at this very minute and yet no one at EDF ever helped me fill in their forms or solve this issue. I have been writing to them and calling them every year. I call it daylight robbery.”

It means she has essentially handed power to the national grid – potentially enough to power another home the size of her own for more than seven years – but not received a penny in return.

“The money is not the reason I did it,” she says. “I installed the solar power panels because I am interested in how we can individually reduce carbon. I wanted to do my bit to lessen the effect on the environment, and saw that over the years the investment would pay for itself in smaller bills. 

“But EDF’s inability to work out how much they should pay me, despite having a meter which measures what I feed into the grid, shows the need for this system to be reviewed and perhaps either central or local government stepping in to regulate it properly to help encourage others to do it.”

An EDF spokesman said they would not be paying for the energy she has given them.

They said: “Mrs Sarnat did sign a Power Purchase Agreement in March 2007 and at the time was advised that an opening meter reading would be required to commence payment under the agreement. Unfortunately, the opening reading was not provided and as such the agreement was never validated and implemented.

“In addition to this, Mrs Sarnat subsequently rented the property out later that year and as such, even if the agreement had been implemented, would not have qualified for any payments from that point as she was no longer the occupier paying the bill.

“All of these conditions were stipulated in the terms and conditions of the agreement that was originally signed by Mrs Sarnat.

“Unfortunately, EDF Energy has to stick within the rules of the schemes stipulated by the regulator and must do so in a consistent manner in the interests of all customers.”

Highgate ward Green party councillor Sian Berry said: “Small-scale generators are a vital part of cutting emissions and increasing efficiency. 

“This case shows that the framework must be improved to make it easier for homeowners to do their bit.”