GreenWire carefully considered where the panels and inverters could be mounted on this office project. As you can see there was limited space on the utility side of the building. The roof had plenty of space to accomodate the 16.5 KW system but the side walls were very limited.
GreenWire decided to install 28 SolarWorld panels on the this south roof hip because these panels will harvest about 12% more power than the ones mounted on the west roof. We then installed the SMA6000 inverter to handle these panels. This inverter is completely loaded with no room for expansion.
GreenWire installed 28 SolarWorld panels on the west roof to a SMA6000 inverter completely loading it up while installing 14 SolarWorld panels to another SMA6000 inverter which can accomodate another 14 panels in the future should the customer decide to expand.
The office building is a 200 Amp, 208 Volt, 3 Phase WYE System. Each SMA6000 is single phase 208 volts so they were balanced across the three phases.
South SMA6000US Inverter
West SMA6000US (x2)
South Panels SolarWorld 235's
GreenWire used the "Quick PV Mounts" which are a tile replacement that are made of milled aluminum. They mount very quickly and meet every code for rain, wind and strength. These mounts can either be attached to rafters or directly to the plywood with additional lags. They have a waterproof taping material and plate under the aluminum tile. There is a great picture shown on our page called "solar tile roof".
The details of this system included (70) Solar World 235 Watt Panels, (3) SMA 6000US Inverters, Unirac Rails and Quick PV Mounts. The wiring was completely hidden in the attic and garage and included and extra cable for a future array.
The total system is 16.5KW DC and cost $100k installed. It carrys a 10 year warranty on the inverter and workmanship and 25 years on the panels. This project has a calculated payback of approximately 7 years because of the federal tax credit, PG&E rebates and the depreciated value taken by the customer. That is a 15% return!
GreenWire believes all systems should be connected online to the internet. The reason is for productivity and maintenence monitoring. This system sends an email out everyday to the owner at 9PM. The owner can easily see in the subject line the amount of money they saved that day as well as the total power collected. If the system ever has a failure we would both know it in one day! Plus, who doesn't like an email that tells them how much money they saved!
