Strategic Energy Case Study - 31 May 2013

Strategic Energy is a creative thinking renewable energy company, operating in the social and affordable housing sectors installing solar photovoltaics for housing associations on either a rent-a-roof or owned outright basis. The company provides a comprehensive service to its customers, from appraisal to installation, including managing finance where necessary and navigating the financial complexities of the Feed in Tariff system.As an example of its innovative approach, the company recently responded to the feed in tariff cut by coming up with a way to make the 16.8p tariff profitable to investors, ensuring that social housing projects continue to have access to this kind of renewable resource for some time to come. Director, Martin Davidson, a quantity surveyor for more than 20 years before taking on this role within the company, is always on the lookout for innovative ways to improve the way the company works and found, with the discovery of the Crompton Combi Complete, that he was able to make life easier for his installers, cutting the time and difficulties on site and therefore improving the service to customers at the same time. The internal controls are in the loft space which is often a restricted area, difficult for installers to work in. It can be an unpleasant part of the job, stuck in such a small space, and perhaps for prolonged periods of time, particularly on the larger projects. As Martin says: “They have to lift components and hold them in place, so the weight and number of components is very important. The Combi Complete is a pre-mounted collection of all the equipment we install in the loft – the inverter, the DC isolator coming from the roof, the generation meter and the AC isolator. It is a lightweight product – simple to lift into the loft, simple to install and commission.” The Combi Complete has revolutionised the way that Strategic Energy’s teams have been able to work – improving productivity and helping the company on the way to reaching its goal of carrying out over 3000 solar photovoltaic installations in 2011/2012. With such ambitious goals and targets, it is vital that the company can trust each component part of every installation. This was one of the reasons to look for answers to the problems and complications of the electrical components installations from a company like Crompton. “We can rest assured that the Combi Complete has been tested and designed and developed by a company with a strong pedigree in the development of electrical components,” says Martin.