Commercial FAQ

Offsetting some or all of your electricity use at a factory or small business with solar reduces electric bills from day one. Plus, solar panel systems operate effectively for over 30 years, and once your business makes back the upfront investment for their system, you can generate free electricity from their panel system for many years after.

Solar helps foster a sustainable brand image
Solar panels are a visible signal that your company is committed to sustainability and a clean energy future. How companies and corporations are responding to environmental responsibility is an increasingly important issue; by taking action to support clean, renewable energy, companies can signal to potential customers that they care about more than just turning a profit. Installing solar is a great way to generate positive buzz with stakeholders and the local community.

There are multiple rebates and incentives available for commercial solar installations. In addition to the investment tax credit (ITC) that allows for the deduction of 22 percent of the cost of the solar energy system from federal taxes, commercial property owners can write off the value of their solar installation through the Modified Accelerated Cost Recovery System (MACRS). This incentive reduces businesses’ tax burden to speed up returns on solar investments.

Advantages of going solar for businesses
There are many good reasons for businesses to generate their own electricity with solar panels:

The solar panels used in commercial and industrial-scale installations are oftentimes larger than residential panels. Large-scale commercial solar installations usually use 96-cell or greater solar panels, meaning each panel is made of 96 or more individual solar photovoltaic cells. For comparison, a typical residential solar panel will have 60 or 72 cells.

There are often many installation options for C&I projects, from factory roof space, to solar carports in parking lots, or large ground-mounted arrays. Unlike most rooftop systems, commercial and industrial solar systems often include intricate racking systems to elevate and tilt the panels. Some commercial panel arrays even use racking with tracking capabilities, allowing the panels to face different directions throughout the day – this helps increase the amount of direct sunlight that hits the panels (and maximizes electricity production!)

Most commercial and industrial solar installations are substantially larger than a typical residential solar panel system. For perspective, the average size of a residential solar panel system is around 8 kilowatts (kW), while a commercial solar energy system can be up to several megawatts (MW) in size, depending on the electricity needs of the facility.

Commercial solar is considered “distributed generation,” meaning that the energy produced by the system is used at or near the point of generation. Distributed generation projects, such as rooftop or ground-mounted residential solar, are usually connected to the local electric grid. This allows for commercial property owners to take advantage of net metering, a policy enabling distributed generation customers to send unused electricity back to the grid in exchange for electricity bill credits.