Big or small, your business can reap the rewards from solar energy. Rising electricity costs, combined with often unused roof space afforded by commercial properties, are clear positives that a solar panel system could be a very good investment. However, not every business is in the position to buy a system outright. At Caldor, we offer two options when it comes to our solar solutions. A company can buy a system outright or it can enter into a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA).
So, What Is A Power Purchase Agreement?
Rather than purchasing a solar system outright from a solar provider, you purchase the electricity that system produces at a discounted price over a set period of time. In other words, you get your electricity at a fixed rate over 10-20 years. This allows you to hedge against inflation of traditional energies and allows you to forecast and project outgoings more accurately. The system itself would remain the property of the solar provider, in our case, Caldor Solar.
This is not only a more cost effective source of electricity, it is green, clean, noiseless and could allow your company to take steps to reduce its carbon footprint and aid in assisting your corporate responsibility. You can read more about the benefits and grants available in our recent blog Solar Solutions for Irish Businesses.
Before moving on, let’s look at an example: If your current electricity cost is €0.26 cents per kilowatt hour, your solar cost could be paying a day rate if €0.347 (this is a current rate at time of posting and based on a number of variables).While you might be able to secure a fixed rate with a traditional energy supplier in the short term, you can lock in your solar rate for the duration of your PPA, which tends to be 10-20 years.
How can the solar costs be so stable? Once the system is in place, the cost of producing solar electricity is free.
What is Outright Ownership?
This question is here for balance but it isn’t something we need to detail, you know the drill. You buy something, you own something. It’s yours. Simple.
Now, let’s pitch these options against one another:
PPA vs Outright Ownership
It all boils down to cost. While a PPA works excellently and allows a reduction in bills spanning decades, there are obvious benefits to owning a solar system outright. It all comes down to figures which should be thoroughly assessed at the beginning of the solar research process. Your company needs to balance the cost and benefits of a PPA or Outright Ownership against your current financial standing and capabilities. PPA involves no upfront cost to client, it doesn’t sit on the balance sheet and there are no maintenance costs.
Get A Desktop Survey
There’s no time like the present to collect the data you need to make a decision as to whether solar solutions are a viable investment for your business. At Caldor, we undertake a desktop survey before going through 12 months of a business’s utility bills for an accurate read on ROI followed by a site visit.
What we look at in this initial phase are:
Your total roof area, available roof area, aspect, maximum panel availability, the expected annual yield and the value of potential monthly production. This is a great step in the right direction.
Following on from this, if it sounds like a product of interest, we would go through 12 months of your company’s utility bills and organise a site visit. Call today and put yourself in a strong position to make strong decisions that can impact your bottom line and your green credentials.
Get in touch with us today by calling us on 01 25 333 49 or email us info@caldorsolar.ie.
If you found this interesting, we think you might like these too:
5 ADVANTAGES AND 5 DISADVANTAGES OF SOLAR FOR BUSINESS
SOLAR SOLUTIONS FOR IRISH BUSINESSES
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