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Solar: Taking Care of Business

Solar is being used by increasingly more businesses every day in applications ranging from heating water to providing a more reliable, clean power source. Solar energy provides a business with "power security", enabling a business to continue operating even when utility power is disrupted.

• A 10% business energy tax credit is available for those businesses that invest in or purchase solar energy property. (Energy Policy Act of 1992- U.S. Code Citation: 26 USC Sec. 48)

• A business can save 40 - 80% on electric or fuel bills by replacing its conventional water heater with a solar water heating system.

• At the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta, a solar pool heating system of over 10,000 square feet was installed that maintained the temperature of the Olympic swimming pool within one degree. It is estimated that this system will save $12,000 annually in reduced heating costs.

• A Wal-Mart store in California has integrated PV into an awning located over the store’s entrance. Over the projected life of the solar system, Wal-Mart will be able to reduce atmospheric pollutants that cause smog by three tons, acid rain by five tons and global warming by 720 tons. It will also save 420 tons of coal, 1,300 barrels of oil, or 93 million cubic feet of natural gas.



• The 24-story Kook Jae office building in Seoul, South Korea meets over 85% of its daily hot water needs with a solar hot water heating system. The system has been in operation since 1984 and is so efficient that it has exceeded it’s design specifications and even provides 10 to 20 percent of the annual space heating requirement.

• The St. Rose Hospital in San Antonio, Texas utilizes a solar thermal water heating system to meet 80% of its hot water needs which translates into 1,200 Million BTUs a year.

• Gould Electronics, Inc. of Chandler, Arizona meets 60% of its annual hot water needs for its copper foil manufacturing facility using a parabolic trough solar collector. The system was installed in 1982 and has had a 90% availability and a monthly energy savings of $7,500.

• A PV manufacturing plant in Fairfield, CA utilizes thin-film PV modules that transmit light, therefore making them appropriate for use in building facades. These electricity-generating PV modules can be used as skylights and awnings, becoming a part of the building’s architectural design. This not only reduces construction costs and provides electricity, but also it contributes to the aesthetics of the structure.

• Solar & Tourism. The most popular tourist destinations are also the places that benefit the most economically and environmentally from clean, quiet solar energy. The average hotel, which operates year-round and has an occupancy rate of 100% for four months and 40% for the remaining months and a cost of electricity of 15 cents/kWh, has an annual electric hot water cost of $2,220. The one-time cost to install a solar hot water system to meet that same demand is as low as US $6,000. This means that the payback time for the solar system can be less than three years. Thereafter, the solar system saves the hotel over $2,000 each year.