Five-digit amount for solar-powered company building

Energy self-sufficiency, a high degree of self-consumption of PV electricity and negative operating costs of almost 16,000 euros across all four sectors – that is the track record of our company building.

Already during the winter period of the first heating season from November 2021 to April 2022, our unique building was energy self-sufficient. The high yield of the 100 kWp photovoltaic system in the facade and on the roof in the summer months with a simultaneous lack of heat demand has now further improved the result. In the first year of operation, the PV system provided 59.9% of the total energy for the building directly. my-PV took the remaining 40.1% of its electricity requirements from the grid. At the same time, however, 3.5 times the amount of solar power was fed into the grid.

Energy self-sufficiency across all 4 sectors

Our solar-powered company building achieved a self-sufficiency of 347.9% in the first year of operation. This value results from the balance of the grid feed-in and the grid purchase. The PV system in the facade and on the roof of the building supplies more than half of the energy. The special feature: The balance includes all sectors, i.e. in addition to the electrical consumers also hot water, space heating and mobility, because my-PV supplies all four sectors purely electrically.

The financial advantage as well suggests switching to full solar-powered supply for commercial buildings. So last year we optimistically calculated annual operating costs of 2,100 euros. That would have been 67 percent less than in commercial buildings of a similar size with conventional heating technology. The calculation was based on the cost of commercial electricity of 16 ct/kWh and revenue from grid feed-in of 4 ct/kWh – both common values ​​at the time of the forecast in September 2021.

Building makes money

Due to the success of the solar-powered concept, we have now been able to reduce the operating costs to 402.84 euros based on the prices from September 2021. However, since energy prices have increased just as drastically since March 2022 as the monetary revenues from the solar power feed-in, our building has now actually recorded a big plus: The solar-powered building technology, which we have of course installed in the building, led to negative operating costs of 15,829 .24 euros. So we even earned a five-figure sum with the operation of the building.

"Even with these shifted framework conditions with higher feed-in than purchase prices, which are absolutely unnatural and not sustainable, our business model proves its potential. Oil and gas have an expiration date, and it is economical to use photovoltaic energy directly in the house, even for heat!” concludes our managing director Dr. Gerhard Rimpler.

More information here.