EDISON, NJ-The rooftop photovoltaic system at one of Federal Business Centers' buildings in Raritan Center Business Park here will offset the equivalent of 13 residential homes when complete next month, but more important, it is a “foot in the water” for future installations and a sign that owners can and may find it wise to own their own arrays, says Solis Partners, which was awarded the turnkey contract for the system.
The system will be housed on the roof of the Buckhead Beef building, a refrigerated distribution center for the national supplier of meat and seafood products, located at 220 Raritan Center Parkway. Consisting of 705 solar panels, it will produce approximately 158,000 kilowatt hours of electricity in its first year of operation.
“Raritan Center is in a very high wind zone, with projects required to build for winds of up to 110 miles per hour,” Jamie Hahn, managing director of Manasquan, NJ-based Solis, tells GlobeSt.com. “But they built an extremely high-quality product.”
The installation has been fairly straightforward, Hahn says. In addition to designing and installing the rooftop solar system, Solis Partners is installing a reflective rooftop coating that will make for a more energy-efficient building envelope. In addition, the roof was new, eliminating a discrepancy between a 25-year warranty on the system and the age of the roof. An older roof could be damaged over time as systems expand and sink in the heat of summer and contract during winter.
“We run into many circumstances where the roof has 10 years left on it,” Hahn says. “But this was something Federal took very seriously. They understand roofing very well.”
This is the first installation for Federal, allowing them to learn the ins and outs of solar energy, and unlike many companies, they have chosen to own the arrays themselves rather than receive the benefits through a power purchase agreement (PPA). “A PPA doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to a developer with a strong tenant,” Hahn says. “It makes sense there to invest in solar as a sustainable building upgrade.”
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