New substructure makes unsuitable roofs suitable for solar panels after all

In practice, 52% of the flat roofs of commercial buildings are not suitable for the installation of solar panels. Solar Guild recently offered in cooperation with Rable a solution that makes many roofs suitable for panels. The substructure supports only the rafters, so the roof is not stressed and solar panels can still be installed.

Commissioned by main contractor Hemubo , this construction has now been successfully applied to the roof of GSF Glasgroep. The GFS Glasgroep recently moved to new premises in Almere and solar panels were high on the wish list. But here too, the roof of the premises proved unsuitable for the installation of solar panels. The main contractor therefore started looking for a solution to make this possible and ended up at Zonnegilde and Rable.

Distribute weight

According to Gerard de Ruiter, director of Zonnegilde, Zonnegilde and Rable complement each other perfectly. 'Rable produces and supplies the innovative substructure, but does not provide installation itself, so they came to Zonnegilde with this question.'

The substructure ensures that roofs that are not strong enough can still be covered with panels without causing the roof to collapse. And because the system rests only on the rafters, it is also possible to use large pieces of roof. The new construction on the roof of GSF Glasgroep's new building, for example, has now enabled the installation of 464 panels of 435 Wp. That's good for about 200kWp or about 180,000 kWh.

Collaboration

'This is the first successfully completed project in collaboration with Rable,' says De Ruiter. 'We hope we can help more companies in the future with this innovative solution. This way, more flat roofs will be eligible for solar panels, which is an extremely positive development for companies that want to make their energy management more sustainable.'