Vertical rooftop PV reaches Vancouver

Vertical solar specialist Over Easy Solar has deployed its first vertical solar installation in the province of British Columbia, Canada.

The installation is located on top of Vancouver’s Science World, a museum located in the central part of the city, and forms part of a CAD 39 million ($27.4 million) retrofit at the museum that also includes air-source heat pumps, electricity chillers and the installation of five inches of insulation inside the museum’s dome. Together, the retrofits are expected to reduce the museum’s energy use by 42%.

Over Easy Solar’s vertical rooftop installation at the museum is a 19.5 kW system spread across three arrays that comprises 76 units of its latest vertical PV unit, the XM-3, paired with ST125 feet which are specifically optimized for gravel roofs and regions with heavy snowfall.

Rob Baxter, co-founder of VREC Solar, the installation company that deployed the system, told pv magazine that Over Easy Solar’s vertical system is the perfect solution for weight-limited roofs. 

“In the past there was not a good solution for flat roofs that could not support ballast or penetrations,” he said, while adding that the main reason for selecting a vertical system in this case was to avoid snow collecting on modules, helping to lead to better performance in winter months.

According to details published on local utility BC Hydro’s website, the vertical installation on Science World’s roof will help explore the potential of vertical PV in snowy and low-height sun conditions, as part of plans to bring more vertical installations to areas of British Columbia where snow poses more of a challenge.

While the Science World array represents Over Easy Solar’s first commercial installation in Canada, the company told pv magazine it has also deployed a test project in Quebec in partnership with utility company Hydro Quebec. The utility is also testing vertical solar to see how it performs during Canadian winter by monitoring how energy yield compares to conventional solar solutions, which are often left covered in snow during winter months.

In April, Over Easy Solar announced it had entered the US market with a pilot installation in New York. The same month, the company shared that its vertical bifacial PV system had outperformed a conventionally-tilted monofacial rooftop PV system in the UK across all seasons during a year-long study.