Are your Solar Panels stolen or counterfeit?

You’ve finally decided to pull the trigger on the generator hum in your garden.  You shop around for inverters and solar panels and you are even looking at Black Friday Specials!!  Why should you then consider using a rock-solid solar power company such as NuEco Solar, whose quote seems slightly higher than the rest?

Very good reason with a myriad of answers.  A very shocking reality is that the dead cheap inverters and solar panels that you see on a Black Friday sale or just the average dead-cheap products, might be stolen or counterfeit solar panels and inverters.

Your black Friday solar panel discount deal might be stolen or counterfeit solar panels and inverters.

On Thursday, 16 November 2023, members of TRU-K9 followed up on information about suspects who were selling stock of solar systems in Mayfair.  On searching the premises at no 2 Park Avenue in Mayfair at Solar Supplies Africa, a variety of stolen and counterfeit solar panels was recovered. 

An expert from the company that makes the solar panels was summoned to the scene and he confirmed that the panels were counterfeit. It was not their brand.  Further investigation led the members of the security team to Northriding and more robbed goods were found and they were booked at Douglasdale SAPS.  The value of the recovered goods is +-2 million rands.

Nobody wants to identify with thieves and fraudsters, but nobody wants to pay more for their solar power system than they must.  The reality is that there are stolen solar panels and inverters on the market and unless you are an expert in the field, you will not know the difference.

In an article published on News24 on 5 October named ‘Daylight robbery: SA’s unique solar theft problem requires local solutions’ it is reported that solar panel theft is on the increase.  The rapid increase in the use of solar equipment in South Africa had been met with a realization by criminals that the equipment was valuable and was often not fixed down securely, which meant it could be stolen,” said Matthew Cruise, a security analyst at Hohm Energy.  “There had been some reports of “bakkie brigade” solar installers, who install solar panels and then steal back the equipment they had installed!”

The question that I have is whether or not it is worth the risk of possibly buying stolen or counterfeit solar panels and inverters.  We already know that the bakkie brigade follows the trends in where there is a buck to make and are not interested in preserving our planet.  Least of all are they interested in being there for you five or ten years down the line?  And yes, it has been recorded that the bakkie brigade can be responsible for the surge in solar panel thefts.

The bottom line is to only use trusted solar consultants and suppliers such as NuEco Solar who have been in the solar energy industry long before load-shedding became a crisis in South Africa.

Give us a no-obligation call today.

Share the Post:

Related Posts

Open chat
💬 Need help? Chat with Us.
Hello 👋
Can we help you?