October 14, 2024 Solar PV, Solar PV Battery
How To Make The Most Of A Solar Power Battery
In today’s eco-conscious business environment, harnessing renewable energy efficiently is not just a trend but a necessity. This article explores world of solar photovoltaic (PV) battery storage, a key component for businesses looking to optimise their energy usage and reduce carbon footprint. Innasol Solar’s PV systems, tailored to meet specific business needs, stand at the forefront of this endeavour. But when does incorporating a solar power battery make sense, and how can it be most effectively utilised?
Understanding the mechanics of solar power battery storage and its practical applications becomes crucial in deciding whether it’s the right fit for your business. We will explore how these systems work, their benefits, and the scenarios where they are most advantageous. Furthermore, we’ll examine Innasol’s approach to designing solar power systems that not only cater to immediate energy needs but also consider the potential of excess electricity generation and its storage. Whether you’re a business leader, an environmental enthusiast, or someone curious about renewable energy solutions, this article will provide valuable insights into making the most of a solar power battery.
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How to make the most of a solar power battery
Innasol Solar’s PV systems are designed with your business’s specific energy usage needs in mind. When designing your system, the goal is to ensure that it generates exactly the amount of energy your business needs to operate.
If it generates less, you will need to import electricity from the grid at a cost. If it generates more, you will need to decide whether to sell it back to the grid for a small return or store it in a battery.
In most cases, we will recommend choosing a battery storage system. This is because it gives you the flexibility to run appliances at a reduced cost, have an emergency ‘power bank’, or even charge electric vehicles.
However, we will only recommend a solar power battery storage system if it is the best, most cost-effective use of any excess electricity you may generate.
To understand what battery storage is, and why it works for some businesses and not others, keep reading.
How does solar power battery storage work?
In straightforward terms, solar power works by taking energy from sunlight (which produces a DC current) and using that DC current to either:
- Power appliances in your business/home
- Be stored in a battery for later use
In the first case, a DC current must go through an AC inverter to turn it into a usable AC current.
However, excess energy that isn’t used to power appliances can be converted back into a DC current for storage in a battery — most often, a lithium-ion or lead-acid battery.
Is battery storage recommended for most solar power systems?
Battery storage offers many benefits and flexibility for a business with a solar power system (which we will talk about shortly). However, these only apply if you generate excess electricity on top of that which your commercial or domestic appliances will already use.
Moreover, contrary to what you may think, systems that produce excess electricity aren’t necessarily the most efficient or cost-effective for your business.
When Innasol design a solar power system, we aim for it to be as close to 100% efficient as possible: one which generates enough electricity for your business activities, minimises the upfront cost, and reduces the time it takes for you to see a return on investment.
When you introduce a battery to store excess electricity, it will add extra cost to a project, and increase that return-on-investment period.
This all means that it isn’t a no-brainer to install a battery – but, if your system will generate excess electricity, it is more cost-effective to keep it on-site with a battery, rather than sending it to (and re-importing it from) the grid.
Which businesses benefit the most from solar power coupled battery storage – and which don’t?
In simple terms, there are two types of businesses that are unlikely to have battery storage:
- Businesses that generate a lot of electricity that gets used immediately
- Businesses with limited roof space
Good examples of these include manufacturing plants, care homes or hotels. Here, the electricity demands are too great (or the roof space too limited) to generate excess electricity.
The types of businesses that are likely to benefit from battery storage are those that see occupancy fluctuate, or which are closed at the weekends – and have enough roof space. Take offices, student accommodation or schools, for instance.
This is because these facilities can generate power over the weekend (when the buildings are vacant) and use stored energy at a peak time (such as a Monday morning or weekday evening). This effectively lets them use stored energy for no cost, instead of electricity from the grid charged at a peak rate.
What exactly can you do with battery storage?
We just described one of the key benefits of solar: utilising excess power for free, instead of sending it back to the grid for little return. However, batteries offer a lot of flexibility for the businesses that use them. For example, you can also:
- Use it to power electric vehicles at your place of work, either pitching it is an ‘employee benefit’, or sold as a service in a car park on an ‘off-peak’ day
- Use it to ‘timeshift’ – essentially, rearranging your schedule to run ‘energy-intensive’ or peak-hour activities (such as doing laundry) on battery instead of importing grid electricity
- Have an emergency reserve of power
Lastly, ‘smart’ homes and businesses can make this excess electricity go even further. Solar power batteries can be configured with smart appliances to automatically run an appliance at a ‘peak time’, effectively using solar instead of grid electricity to save more money.
Why choose Innasol to install a solar power system?
If there is one fact to take away from this blog, it’s that solar power batteries aren’t appropriate for every business – your business’ solar panel installation will be more efficient and cost-effective without batteries if you use electricity as soon as you generate it.
However, for those businesses that do generate excess electricity, a solar power battery can give you flexibility as an emergency ‘back-up’ system, a way to reduce your site’s operating costs, or even generate another source of income (through the example of eV charging).
The only way to know this for sure is to have a system designed around your business’ specific electricity needs.
Innasol collects a year’s worth of data on your business’ electricity usage (to the half-hour) to understand exactly how much electricity you use, how much you could generate from a solar power system, and whether you will generate excess electricity.
Only when you know that will you know whether a solar power battery can be a smart, cost-effective part of your business’ solar power system.
We hope that this has clarified which businesses benefit most from solar power battery storage. Innasol’s design-led philosophy ensures that your business’ solar power system delivers the maximum possible electricity at the minimum cost in the shortest period for your business. If you want to learn more about our solar power offer – and if you are considering generating low-cost, zero-carbon energy for your business, just get in touch to talk to an expert.
