IN Brief:
- Liberty Wines has reduced electricity costs at its Basingstoke warehouse after installing a commercial rooftop solar system.
- The project integrates rooftop PV, SolarEdge technology, and EV charging control.
- Commercial solar is increasingly being designed as part of wider site electrification and energy-management strategies.
Liberty Wines has reduced electricity costs by £86,480 in 10 months following the installation of a rooftop solar PV system at its warehouse in Basingstoke.
The project was delivered by Insight Energy and integrates commercial-scale solar generation with EV charging infrastructure and SolarEdge technology. The installation includes more than 1,000 solar panels and has been designed to supply warehouse operations while coordinating EV charging with real-time solar output.
SolarEdge’s case-study material describes a 515kWp installation, while trade coverage of the project cites a 521kWp rooftop system with 1,005 solar panels and four 90kW inverters. The system has generated 376MWh of electricity and supplied around 63% of site demand during its first 10 months of operation.
The Basingstoke facility is a 96,000-square-foot temperature-controlled warehouse, giving the project a substantial on-site demand profile. Refrigeration, lighting, materials handling, office loads, and EV charging can all contribute to persistent electricity consumption, which improves the case for self-consuming rooftop generation.
EV charging was also brought into active use as part of the project. Chargers installed during the original site build had remained dormant, but the upgraded system now uses an OCPP-certified platform to coordinate charging with solar generation. Charging modes include priority, scheduled, and boost settings, while group-based billing separates different user categories, including company-owned and personal EVs.
Commercial solar projects are increasingly moving beyond straightforward rooftop generation. The strongest schemes are being designed around how electricity is consumed, controlled, stored, and matched with new loads. A PV array, inverter system, EV chargers, monitoring platform, and site energy controls can operate as one electrical system rather than as separate installations.
That integrated approach is becoming more important as commercial and industrial sites face higher electricity costs, fleet electrification, and local connection constraints. Where a site can consume a high share of its own generation, rooftop solar can reduce imports and exposure to peak tariffs. Where EV charging is aligned with generation and site demand, charging infrastructure can be expanded with less avoidable pressure on the local network.
The same direction was visible at Hannover Messe, where EV charging, storage, low-voltage grid control, and battery-backed capacity management were presented as connected parts of industrial and infrastructure electrification. Liberty Wines’ warehouse project applies that model at site level, using rooftop generation and digital control to support both operations and transport electrification.
Rooftop solar has a practical network advantage where generation is consumed close to the point of production. It can reduce daytime imports and make use of existing built assets without requiring new land. Export, storage, and EV charging still need proper network assessment, but the alignment between generation and load can improve the project’s operational and commercial case.
For electrical contractors, installations of this type require coordination across roof structure, DC string design, inverter selection, isolators, fire safety, monitoring, earthing, metering, EV charger commissioning, software integration, and site continuity. A warehouse that remains operational during installation also places pressure on sequencing, access, safety planning, and commissioning discipline.
The reported savings show why commercial rooftop solar remains attractive even as grid and market conditions change. Installed capacity is only one measure of performance. Self-consumption, load profile, charger behaviour, inverter architecture, maintenance access, and energy-control strategy all influence the value delivered over the life of the system.
Liberty Wines’ installation is therefore a site electrification project as much as a solar installation. The rooftop provides the generation, but the value comes from how that electricity is converted, managed, consumed, and aligned with emerging fleet and warehouse loads.
