Skyline Innovations made its first West Coast installations and is successfully expanding its solar thermal business into California.

Skyline is a Washington, D.C.-based business that had success with its unique financing model there and has taken aim at one of the hottest solar destinations in the world right now – California.

Skyline installed solar hot water heaters on three multi-family buildings owned by WGL Holdings in Southern California. WGL will pay 25 percent less than it pays to the utility company for natural gas to heat its water, said Skyline marketing director Sandra Lee.

The discount is fixed and tied to utility pricing for six years. After six years of paying Skyline, WGL will own the system outright.

Lee said that Skyline saw customers react hesitantly to traditional power purchase agreements where they signed a contract to pay a fixed price for the energy over a 10- to 20-year period.

The problem with that model, Lee said, is that customers can end up upside down, paying more for energy than their neighbors and their competition if the utility company’s prices go down or don’t rise as projected.

“We needed to solve for that risk factor,” Lee said.

That’s how the price index power purchase agreement was born.

She said the model allows companies to install solar thermal solutions with no upfront money and pay it off with a discount to the bill it would pay to the traditional utility.

The model worked in D.C. and these apartment buildings are Skyline’s first projects in California. The company targets businesses that use a lot of hot water like hotels and apartment complexes. These California complexes brought Skyline’s total multifamily installations to 31.

She said Skyline has established an office in Los Angeles and has hired one new team member with plans to hire another three. Growth in California could be significant, she said.

The installer Skyline uses in D.C. grew from just four employees to 25 in keeping up with business. Lee said she expects similar growth on the West Coast.

She said Skyline is partnering with California installers for the work.

Image courtesy of Skyline Innovations