Covers Builders Merchants is set to install Azur Solar solutions across the UK after successfully completing trial projects at six of its branches in Southern England. The installations at the Covers Home Ideas store, the Covers Trade Centre at Chichester and the depots at Aldershot, Bognor, Gosport, and Portsmouth will now be used as reference sites.

“At Covers we are committed to sustainability which is why we are adopting solar PV from Azur Solar across the company,” explained Rupert Green, the Director in charge of Sustainability at Covers.  “We have started reaping the benefit of reduced energy costs within our branches and have gone one stage further by marketing ‘Azur Solar Power Kits’ to our customers through our newly remodelled Eco Centre. Working with our installation partners we have completed seven domestic installations, with many others in the pipeline.”

Covers selected the Azur 2P self-cleaning, self-healing coated panels for its coastal branches as they not only help prevent sea salt and other particles covering the panels but they also produce up to 15% more lifetime power.

“We are delighted to have chosen Azur Solar as our partner to develop Covers’ Solar PV potential both as an investment on our branch roofs and in helping us to promote the benefits to our customer base.  As well as being a good financial investment for us, the estimated saving of 227 tonnes of CO2 each year is important in helping us play our part in mitigating climate change.  Our customers also recognise the benefits solar PV delivers and in-branch interest is growing by the week,” Green continued.

“The economic and environmental benefits of solar PV are now being appreciated, but key factors in our winning Covers and other contracts were our exacting standards and our ability to actively manage every aspect of the solar supply chain from initial design and manufacture, through installation to after sales service,” said Robert Markus Feldmann, Managing Director for Azur Solar Systems.

To date 2,055 panels and 26 inverters, delivering a total of 473kWp have been commissioned. Covers also plans to install solar PV on two more depots later in the year.