Commercial & small business, 65 tools
What does commercial solar actually save your business?
Run the numbers on system cost, demand charges, MACRS depreciation, and financing terms. These tools cover everything from a single storefront to a multi-building portfolio, plus the nonprofit and tax-exempt cases the residential calculators skip, and the solar panel calculator gives the whole-system size those commercial numbers start from.
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The tool most business owners run first
Financial returns
Payback, ROI, and long-term returns
Tax credits and depreciation
MACRS, bonus depreciation, and the ITC
Financing and ownership
Compare how you pay for the system
Nonprofit and public entities
Tools for entities that can't use the ITC directly
By building type
Size for the building you actually run
Demand charges and bills
The part your residential-solar friends never deal with
Battery and storage
Pair storage with your commercial system
Mounting and site
Roofs, canopies, and ground mounts
Equipment and permitting
What it costs to actually get it installed
Fleets and quick tools
EV charging and a five-minute first estimate
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Questions
Frequently asked
Most commercial systems run $1.10 to $1.80 per watt after installation, before incentives. A 100 kW system on a mid-size warehouse lands around $130,000 to $160,000 before the 30% federal ITC and any state rebate. Run your own square footage through the system size by square footage tool to get a project-specific number. The Energy Information Administration's commercial building energy data is the source for the usage figures behind those per-watt ranges.
Most businesses see payback in 4 to 8 years once MACRS depreciation and the ITC are factored in, versus 8 to 12 years on the raw cash cost alone. The payback calculator and demand charge reduction estimator both build this in directly. The loan term comparison tool shows how the loan term moves that payback window.
Yes, through direct pay under the Inflation Reduction Act, even though nonprofits pay no federal income tax to offset against. The nonprofit financing tool and church financing tool both model this option. The IRS elective pay and transferability page explains the direct pay rules those tools model.
The ITC is a direct 30% credit against your tax bill in year one. MACRS lets you deduct most of the remaining system cost over 5 years, on top of the credit. The MACRS schedule calculator and combined rebate and MACRS tool show both together.