Novatech has become the latest IT provider to install solar panels at its HQ in an investment.
The PC builder and public sector supplier has installed 825 solar panels on the roof of its Portsmouth facility as part of wider plans to reduce its carbon footprint. It hopes to start feeding the electricity generated back into the grid from May.
CEO David Furby says will pay for itself within six to seven years and bolster its carbon reduction efforts. Novatech’s 30,000 square foot, south-facing roof and geographic positioning on the south coast made the 400kW installation a “no brainer”, Furby said.
“Everybody’s got to start thinking about how to become some net zero. And one of the big things is the energy we’re using – both gas and electricity – to power our building. We’ve got a very large roof”, he explained.
“We’ve done other things like reducing energy in the building where we can. And this was the obvious next option. We started looking at it a couple of years ago, but we really thought ‘let’s crack on’ in July or August last year. We got all our panels in October. But you want to see the payback. I know when we looked at it as a project in October – before electricity prices really started rising – it was about six or seven years.”
He said the building was 25 years old and the company had to look at the switching and everything else because it was never designed to take 400 kilowatts off the roof.
“We’re also connecting electric car chargers to the side of the building. They’ll be powered off [the roof]. We have a policy whereby if you want a new company car now, it has to be electric”, he said.
