There were plenty of reasons for Great Bay Distributors to equip the roof of its new building with a solar power system, but Ron Petrini, CEO of the beverage supplier, sums it up this way: “It was the right thing to do.” “We didn’t start with the tax benefits and return on investment and work backwards,” he explained.
“It was something we had decided to do, and all the different advantages came as a pleasant surprise.” He knew that the system would essentially pay for itself over a period of time. But he did not know that it would take approximately six years, after which it would offset 90 percent of the building’s energy cost going forward.
Or that the cash gained over the system’s guaranteed 25-year lifespan would be close to $6 million. He did not know at the outset that Great Bay would be eligible for a 30 percent federal tax credit on project expenditures.
Those figures were provided by SEIA member Solar Energy Management, the Tampa company that is building and installing the apparatus. CEO Scott McIntyre expects to begin putting in the solar array at the end of July and finish in three months.