IES has the experience and expertise to help our commercial clients get through the application phases, engineering studies, system designs and the complete installation of your new system.

Commercial systems are any size from 10kW and up. Due to the costs of engineering studies and connection impact assessments, IES recommends that the smallest commercial system be no smaller than 50 kW. During the 2017 to 2018 installation seasons, IES installed 13 large scale system ranging in size from 60kW to 500kW AC.

The options for commercial solar arrays are:

Net Metering (Grid-Tie Systems)

This is the most common type of grid-connected commercial solar installations. Net metering allows a business to install a system on their roof (or in their yard as a ground mounted unit) and completely offset or reduce their monthly energy bills.

How does net metering work? Once a solar system is installed on the roof and it is producing energy, all of the energy produced will be automatically deducted from the energy that the home has consumed. The business is then billed for the net difference between what they purchased and what they sold.  During the spring and summer months when production is at its maximum, there may be instances where the solar system produces more energy than what the business consumes. In this case, the electrical account for the business will be in a credit position. This account will hold credits for the period of 1 year until they are used up (typically in the winter months). If you have credits left over at the 1 year time, they are erased and a new 1 year period starts.

Load Displacement

This option is essentially the exact same as net metering, however, this is reserved for larger sites that want a small solar array for a variety of reasons. Due to the large energy loads at these sites, and because the solar array is small, the business account will never be in a credit position.

Why would businesses want to do this?

• The business will save money on their monthly energy bills.
• A business may want to get an understanding of solar energy and so they install a smaller system to get a feel for it.
• In many cases, business’ want to promote their environmental stewardship and use the solar system as a form of marketing and branding.

Commercial Solar is best suited to businesses which have a long-term view of their operations. Schools, Churches, family farms, Commercial Farms, manufacturing facilities, storage facilities, Etc.  Any Business that should be looking to mitigate their long term energy costs over the next 30 years.

Example: Greenhouse operation with ample roof space

Annual energy usage: 500,000 kWh

Annual energy bill: $0.20/kWh = $100,000.00/ year

Solar system size: 450,000kW DC = $900,000.00 (conservative pricing estimation)

Question: What is the price per kW for this business over the next 20 and 30 years?

• Over the course of 20 years, that solar system will have produced 10.594208 mW/ $900,000.00 = a true cost of $0.08/kWh
• Over the course of 30 years, that solar system will have produced 15.506095 mW / $900,000.00 = a true cost of $0.06kWh

As you can see, there are significant savings to be had for businesses who implement a long-term energy plan. Currently, the Ontario government is subsidizing the province’s energy. Once this stops, energy rates will increase significantly and this will be a burden for large energy-consuming businesses.