This is a useful online tool to help you calculate area and dimensions of a potential solar roof. The screenshot below left shows us calculating the potential of our own office roof, which is a bit small unfortunately although it points the right way.

The tool itself is on the right. You can search for your address using the address box at the top then use the buttons on the map to zoom in and out and find your roof. You will then need to follow the directions on the website. Basically you click four times on the corners of the roof and a fifth time back on the first point. It then shows you a red line: drag it so that it points up the roof (as if you were positioning a ladder up the roof). At the bottom of the page it will then tell you the area as well as the orientation (and give an estimate of the peak power you could generate. We will not use their calculation but it’s interesting to see). The area is given in square feet so multiply by 0.093 to get square metres

Example: our office in Ludlow:

Interactive tool:

August 26th, 2010 | Category: news | Subscribe to comments | Both comments and pings are currently closed