Discovery Green recently conducted extensive research into how South African companies are investing in sustainable energy.
Embedded solar systems often run without extensive battery storage, meaning they cannot bank enough of their excess generated energy for use when the sun goes down. Much of this externally-sourced electricity will be required during off-peak periods, which is late at night and early in the morning during the week, significant parts of Saturday, and the whole of Sunday.
Making matters worse is that electricity from the national grid is more expensive during these off-peak periods – compounding the lost value from an over-investment in renewable energy.A solution available to South African businesses to combat their need for power from the national grid is to use wheeled solar.
This is because they offer a limited supply of battery-stored electricity during off-peak periods, as opposed to the actively-generated solar power they can wheel during the day.