Commercial and Government

Reduce Your Building’s Operating and Maintenance Costs with Renewable Energy

Building owners and leasers are rapidly starting to realize the amount of money they spend on operating and maintenance expenses. More and more of them are coming to Capital Sun Group to reduce these variable costs. Whether it’s installing solar or applying different energy efficiency measures in most cases systems installed on commercial buildings have a faster payback than residential systems.

Businesses are eligible for more extensive city, county, and state incentives. The limits on these incentives are often higher than those for residential systems. Another reason for the faster payback is accelerator depreciation. Businesses may take an accelerated 5-year depreciation on the cost of system under the federal Modified Accelerated Cost Reduction System (MACRS).

This year (2020), in addition to the standard MACRS there is a 100% bonus depreciation available for renewable energy systems. So a percentage related to your marginal tax rate and the total upfront cost of the system is typically taken out of your gross income over the five year period, but now the first year you will receive a 100% bonus on the total amount that will be depreciated. More on the subject of standard MACRS can be found here.

The Tax Cut and Jobs Act of 2017 changed how we can depreciate solar on the federal level. With the new tax bill, businesses can now depreciate 100% of the cost basis in the first year. This 100% bonus depreciation allows you to accelerate all the federal tax benefits to immediately help offset installation costs. Click here for the source.

Growing evidence suggests that green investment pays off multiple times in the long run. An environmental report released in 2003 asserts that financial investment in a green building can pay for itself 10 times over. The report, conducted jointly by the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, several California state agencies and clean-energy consultant The Capital E Group, used national data from 100 green buildings. The data concluded that sustainable buildings lower operations and maintenance costs between $50 and $70 per sq. ft., or about 10 times the additional costs associated with green buildings.

Investment in a green building is also a great way to hedge against raising utility/energy rates. Utility rates are raising every year, add to that the fluctuations between months, the variability can really hurt your bottom-line. Investing in a green building is a great way to turn the variable amount of money you spend on utilities to more of a more certain/fixed cost. For buildings with high utility rates due to heating large amounts of water such as laundromats, hotels, restaurants and community pools a large solar thermal system could offset a large portion.

Besides the incentives, depreciation, and utility cost protection investing in green buildings also raises property value, Increases likely hood of media attention and improves vacancy rates. A building that is more economically and operationally efficient will sell for more than one that is inefficient in both. In relation to all the buildings in the country, green buildings only make up a small amount. Since this is the case your building will likely get more media attention than a traditional building because you are one the cutting edge modern construction. This efficiency and extra attention is shown to increase the vacancy rates in green buildings.

Regrettably most building owners aren’t sure if or how solar and other green building technologies can save them money. On top of the reasons listed above, most commercial roofs are great candidates for solar( i.e. large roofs and and minimum shading). Contact Capital Sun Group today and we can have you saving tomorrow.


Please take a look at some of the past systems we have installed for our government and commercial clients. To the right and below this text you will find the systems, for additional details and pictures please click on the photo or description.