Applications for Commercial Solar Water Heating
- Details
Business that have applications for high hot water needs or industrial heat processing are ideal for installing solar commercial water heaters. The more hot water or heat that is consumed the better and faster the paybacks. Business such as car washes, hotels, laundry facilities, commercial pools, food and beverage industry, and agriculture such as dairy are all great industries to take advantage of solar water heating. Large resorts and Hotel resorts in the Caribbean can have paybacks in less than one year by installing a commercial solar water heater for their laundry facilities.
Going Green- There is more than just cost savings for companies to invest in solar water heating. Research shows that consumers prefer companies that have a clear “Green” Policy versus ones that don’t it is important for consumers to know that the companies they deal with are environmentally conscious and customer will pay a premium for this! What better way to highly your businesses commitment to “Green Energy” than a large display of solar water heaters on the roof? Solar water heating helps get your business noticed!
Tax Write Off- Like any capital investment your investment as a company is able to be written off similar to any other piece of machinery. In some instances such as Canada and USD, Green investment receives an added tax benefits for a company.
Car Washes
Perhaps one of the best opportunities for commercial solar heating applications is for car washes. The reason is simple, hot water is the main operating cost of these facilities so adding solar water heaters can quickly improve the bottom line. Another advantage that car washes have is that their business is weather related. When it is nice and sunny out people want clean cars. When it is cloudy and rainy a car wash is generally empty. Next time you drive by a car wash take a look, chances are you’ll find lineups on sunny days. These are the days when solar can provide the most return, when the car wash needs hot water the more!Agriculture
An area that is often overlooked but perhaps the best opportunity for solar is the Agriculture industry such as dairy farmers. In this industry sanitization is heavily enforced and hot water sanitization is required sometimes as often as four times a day! This means a lot of hot water is used. It is not uncommon for a dairy farmer to consume 2,000-4,000 gallons of hot water daily. The other advantage that large agriculture facilities have is generally un-limited roof space with clear skylines! Farms are out in the open with no neighbouring buildings and large barns mean large roof space to add solar water heaters.Hotels
Hotels are a great opportunity to install solar. They have a huge hot water demand starting with the showers in the room! They also have to wash the sheets on a daily basis and this consumes tremendous amounts of hot water. Hotel restaurants also require hot water constantly for their dish washing and food preparation. If a hotel has an indoor pool then they have a major heating bill in the winter that can be supplemented by solar.Laundry Facilities
Commercial Laundry Facilities can be one of the highest consumers of hot water, and are a great opportunity for solar water heating. Mega Resorts have laundry facilities the size of football fields, hospitals and personal care homes have large laundry facilities that all can benefit from solar. Generally these large commercial laundry facilities operate during the day so they can take advantage of the sun all year round.Commercial Pools
No one likes a cold pool except maybe Polar Bears! Most commercial pool facilities in Canada and USA are heated, and heating a pool requires millions of BTU’s of energy. Solar is ideal application for heating any pool and indoor pools and recreations centers are the perfect candidate for investing in solar energy. Pool system have the advantage in that they don’t require expensive storage tanks as the pool is the storage facility.Food and Beverage Industry
The food and Beverage industry uses lots of heat energy, this can be directly hot water use or in some cases what we call process heating. Process heating is heat energy that is used to heat up the food or liquids and solar thermal energy can easily be transferred to useable process heat. The more consistent the process heat requirement the less requirement for storage as the solar can be used directly in the application. In some cases hot air is needed for drying foods, solar can easily be added to help assist the drying process. Thinks organic and natural foods processed with Green Energy! That is a winning combination!Apartments and Multi-Unit Dwellings
Apartment owners generally have a shared hot water facility for all units. This can be costly especially when the landlord pays the water bill. When a central heating system is used then it is easy for a landowner to supply free solar water to the tenants by installing a commercial solar water heater.
For more information on this topic and others, please contact our office:
The TLJ Team