This building was the refractory for the building behind it called The Button Factory in Portsmouth, NH.
The Button Factory manufactured…..buttons. The curious thing about this building is the roof is made of ceramic tile that no doubt kept the building from burning down. It also meant there was nothing to bolt to, and a new sprayed foam roof made it more complicated. Finally because the building was so narrow there would be no 10’ buffer zone around the panels that is normally required.
All of these conditions required substantial engineering, and in the end, 250 pounds of concrete block per panel to be sure it would all stay put when the wind picks up.
This system is driven by panels that came with individual mini inverters pre-mounted to the solar panels. This was ideal for this installation because the two sections face different directions and will perform differently at different times of the day.
In addition these older buildings tend to have less than ideal electrical systems and this one was no exception. The service was old and technically illegal. If we touched it we needed to bring the entire system up to code. So we did that as well as install a new underground connection to the power pole making the front of the building far less cluttered.
Contact Bill Buckley, Buckley Gould Real Estate buckleytaiji@gmail.com
Online monitoring provides constant feedback on system performance. Hourly, daily and monthly reporting provides valuable tracking for system performance. With mini inverters we can even see if a specific panel/inverter combination is functioning properly.
