Integrating solar panels onto buildings can be quite challenging. Sometimes the challenges might relate to the physical design and installation aspect, for example on curved rooftops and façades, rooftops with skylights and other obstructions, etc. At other times, the challenges may relate to the aesthetic aspect where creating or maintaining a certain appearance is very important, for example on architecturally unique buildings, sites of significance, protected buildings etc. Quite often, it will be a combination of both.
Another challenge that can arise from solar panels is glare (sunlight reflecting off the solar panel surface) towards nearby road users, residential amenity, aviation activity and railway infrastructure. Pager Power has strong experience in assessing glint and glare generated by solar panels and can help developers to determine the potential impacts upon nearby receptors. This can involve further work investigating mitigation options, one of which can be optimising the design of a solar panel layout to remove/reduce the significant glare to an acceptable glare. For more information about what we do, please get in touch.
Notable Solar Panel Designs
Some notable examples [1] of buildings that have integrated solar panels in innovative ways include:
- Google Bay View Campus in California, USA;
- The Dutch Biotape in the UAE;
- LAD headquarters in China;
- Mount Sinai Kyabirwa Surgical Facility in Uganda;
- 550 Spencer office tower building in Australia;
- Copenhagen International School in Denmark;
- Sun Rock office building in Taiwan.
Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
Another notable recent rooftop solar installation is on the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in Spain [2]. This consists of 300 solar panels and is projected to allow a saving of around 5% in the museum’s electricity consumption, providing an average of 30% of the total electricity demand of the building. This is said to be enough to cover the lighting needs of all the exhibition halls.
The solar panels have been installed on the two largest roofs of the building, and designed such that they are not visible from street level and are integrated into its architecture using chromatically integrated solar panels. The design and colour of the solar panels was chosen to match with the rooftop covering and the skylights.
Figure 1: Unique architecture of Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. [3]
Powerhouse Brattørkaia Office in Norway
An example of where solar has been integrated from the off is the Powerhouse Brattørkaia office in Norway, which produces at least double the amount of electricity that it uses daily. It was designed by a Norwegian architectural firm called Snøhetta, and has 3000 square metres of solar panels covering the pentagon-shaped rooftop and upper façade. The shape of the building was cleverly designed to harvest as much solar energy as possible, which is made especially challenging because of how far north the building is located (sunlight varies greatly across the day and seasons).
Snøhetta also designed the Powerhouse Telemark office in Porsgrunn which has solar panels covering the angular roof and south-facing façade.
Figure 2: Powerhouse Brattørkaia office building. [4]
Conclusions
Energy-neutral and energy-positive buildings are the future, and the buildings outlined in this article are able to use solar panels without compromising on aesthetics by using creative and ambitious designs.
References
[1] https://www.dezeen.com/2022/09/07/ten-buildings-creative-solar-panels-roundup/#:~:text=A%20%22dragonscale%20solar%20skin%22%20forms,the%20building’s%20total%20energy%20needs last accessed 14th August 2024
[2] https://www.pv-magazine.com/2024/07/29/iberdrola-installs-80-kw-pv-system-at-guggenheim-museum-bilbao/
[3] https://www.pexels.com/photo/gray-concrete-building-near-body-of-water-10473377/ last accessed 14th August 2024
[4] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2e/Powerhouse_Bratt%C3%B8rkaia%2C_Trondheim%2C_Noruega%2C_2019-09-06%2C_DD_27.jpg last accessed 14th August 2024
