Kingspan Energy designed and installed a rooftop solar system for Kingspan Environmental, a separate division of Kingspan Group. The 1.3 MW array at Kingspan’s manufacturing plant in Northern Ireland will generate 1.1 GWh per year, enough to meet 30 percent of the site’s daytime annual energy demand.
The site comprises the company’s head office and principal manufacturing facility where it makes solar thermal water heating panels as well as other environmental products.
The system was installed under a fully-funded model, with Kingspan Environmental bearing no capital cost. In return for this investment, the company will purchase the electricity generated by the PV array at a reduced rate compared with current grid-based prices. Future price rises will be index-linked to limit them to inflation under this arrangement.
The system was installed in conjunction with the replacement of the life-expired roof at the site. A new, highly energy-efficient insulated panel roof was installed on the building to improve its thermal performance, with the rooftop solar PV system mounted on top.
All divisions within the Kingspan Group have committed to achieve net-zero energy by 2020. The Group has an interim goal of ensuring 50 percent of its energy demand is met by renewables by 2016, and so has refurbished and installed rooftop solar PV panels at a number of its sites across the UK and Ireland.
The installation consists of 4,844 modules in total. It took about 12 weeks to instal