A development in the north of the island has gone green.

The AFD Group, which took over the old Island Film Studios site just outside Ramsey in 2014, has been developing and modernising the facilities.

As well as providing business incubator and co-working space, the 25-acre Mountain View Innovation Centre has been landscaped and now boasts what the company says are some of the most environmentally-friendly working spaces in Europe.

The recent addition of a what is calls a ’huge solar array’ on the roof of Studio One now means that the property is currently generating over 400kWH (units) of genuinely green electricity per day.

The project to instal the ’array’ took two years.

The business says it had to overcome various planning delays, careful engineering considerations and utility tariffs that are not yet designed to encourage green energy.

David Dorricott, group managing director, said: ’Our system has finally come on-stream, after some last-minute concerns from the MUA.

encouraged

’While systems of this size are fairly common across Europe now, and being actively encouraged by governments, being the first here on the island has led to the need to break-through.

’Even yet, we’ve had to turn off the peak generating capability of our system - as that might tip us into punitive tariffs.

’We still have three more south-facing roofs and we’d love to add to our systems once the path is more straightforward!

’For now though, in the long sunny days we are currently enjoying, AFD is generating more electricity than it is consuming!

’It is possible to use the internet to view, in real-time, just what our system is doing - you can almost watch the cloud shadows crossing our roof - though of course the wonderful weather "down north" means there are not many of those!’

The array consists of 234 JA Solar Smart Modules, each capable of generating 275 Watts and therefore providing an overall potential direct current generation of 64,340 Watts of energy production for the site.

optimisation

Each module is complete with embedded smart optimisation, thus providing individual monitoring across the entire array to ensure maximum energy harvest is achieved across the lifespan of the system.

The array is controlled by two separate 25kw ’SolarEdge’ three phase Inverters which convert the power in line with the Isle of Man mains supply.

SolarEdge is a global leader in smart energy technology and the Mountain View system is covered by a 25-year warranty to provide confidence that the system will more than pay back its investment.

The electricity generated is distributed across the Mountain View site - with surplus then fed into the Manx National Grid.

Real-time views of the solar system’s actual performance can be seen on www.mvic.im.

The design and installation of the system was undertaken by solar specialists Manx Solar Energy and AFD thanked Martin Coyle and his team for all their patience, perseverance - and the results.

AFD and Manx Solar Energy expect that, over the month of June alone, electricity production will be close to 12MWh, saving around 6,500kg of CO2 emissions.