490 kW Solar PV on a Multi-Tenant Managed Services Colocation — Birmingham

Project background

Birmingham is the UK’s second city and a significant data centre market in its own right — driven by proximity to a population of 4.3 million in the West Midlands conurbation, good fibre connectivity through the Midlands digital infrastructure spine, and historically lower commercial property costs than London or the South East. The city’s data centre market serves primarily regional enterprise customers and the growing Midlands technology sector.

This project involved a managed services colocation facility serving SME and mid-market enterprise tenants. Unlike the carrier-neutral hyperscale facilities in London Docklands or the pure wholesale colocation in Slough, a managed services colocation serves smaller tenants who typically co-locate 1–5 racks, rely on the operator for managed networking and security, and have direct sustainability procurement relationships with their own customers.

The multi-tenant nature of this facility introduced a requirement that is distinctive to managed services environments: the operator needed to demonstrate to existing tenants that the solar installation improved their sustainability credentials as tenants — not just the operator’s corporate reporting.

The facility and tenant context

The building is a purpose-built colocation and managed services facility in an established industrial and business park location in South Birmingham, approximately 4 km from the M42 Junction 6. The facility was commissioned in 2013 and extended in 2019 to its current capacity. It operates at Tier III standard with 2.4 MW average IT load across a mixed tenant base of approximately 45 SME and mid-market tenants.

The roof is a single-pitch metal deck roof at 6° pitch, south-facing — one of the most solar-suitable configurations in our portfolio. Available PV area is 5,400 sqm, with minimal plant obstruction (the facility uses predominantly ground-level cooling plant rather than rooftop HVAC). The south-facing pitch means a landscape portrait mounting at 15° (matching the existing pitch) delivers near-optimum annual generation for the West Midlands latitude.

Multi-tenant sustainability alignment

The sustainability engagement with this project was more complex than a single-operator facility because the solar investment’s benefits needed to be communicated accurately and equitably to 45 different tenants, each with their own sustainability reporting obligations.

Working with the operator’s account management team, we developed a tenant communication and REGO allocation framework:

For tenants with sustainability reporting obligations:

• Each tenant’s proportion of total facility electricity consumption (calculated from their metered IT load) was matched to a proportional allocation of annual REGO certificates
• Certificates were provided in digital format suitable for inclusion in GHG Protocol Scope 3 supply chain disclosures
• The MCS project registration number and certificate details were shared in a tenant sustainability data pack

For tenants bidding for contracts with sustainability procurement criteria:

• The operator added a standardised statement to their service description: “This facility generates [X]% of its electricity from on-site solar PV (MCS-certified), reducing Scope 2 market-based emissions attributable to hosted IT infrastructure by [Y] kg CO₂e per kW·month.”
• Two tenants subsequently used this statement in formal procurement responses — and one cited the REGO documentation as supporting evidence in a sustainability questionnaire that required third-party verification of supplier renewable energy claims.

This multi-tenant framework required more administrative work than a single-operator project, but it created measurable commercial value for tenants — which in turn strengthened their relationships with the operator.

System design

The 490 kW array uses 972 JA Solar JAM66D30-500/GB half-cut bifacial PERC modules at 500 Wp each. Bifacial modules were specified for this south-facing installation because the single-pitch metal deck roof in a light-coloured commercial estate environment has sufficient albedo (ground reflectance) to generate meaningful rear-side generation — approximately 8–12% additional yield on the rear side relative to monofacial modules of equivalent wattage.

Nine SMA Sunny Tripower 55kW commercial inverters connect to a dedicated solar generator sub-distribution board installed adjacent to the existing LV distribution boards. The south-facing roof pitch allows the mounting system — Schletter FixZ2 in landscape portrait at 15°, matching the existing roof pitch — to use minimal ballast weight, as the panels are mounted flush to the roof rather than against it.

The G99 Protection Relay application was submitted to National Grid Electricity Distribution (NGED, formerly Western Power Distribution) for the West Midlands area. The application was approved in 28 working days — the fastest G99 approval in this portfolio.

System summary:

• Array capacity: 490 kW (972 × 500 Wp JA Solar JAM66D30 bifacial)
• Inverters: 9 × SMA Sunny Tripower 55kW
• Mounting: Schletter FixZ2, 15° south-facing portrait (matching roof pitch)
• Grid connection: NGED G99 (28 working days — fastest in portfolio)
• Bifacial yield uplift: +9.2% measured rear-side generation (first year)
• Monitoring: SMA Monitoring + API export to tenant sustainability dashboard

Birmingham irradiance

Birmingham receives approximately 1,480 hours of sunshine annually — less than Cambridge (1,600) or Crawley (1,650), but comparable to the national average. The south-facing roof orientation partially compensates for the lower irradiance, delivering annual generation close to East-West-oriented systems in sunnier southern locations.

The 21p/kWh grid rate in Birmingham is the lowest in our data centre solar portfolio (reflecting the lower wholesale electricity prices in the Midlands compared to London-adjacent sites). This means the absolute annual saving (£90,600) is lower than the equivalent system in Slough or Crawley, even though the installed capacity (490 kW) is greater.

Results

The system was commissioned in June 2025 and has completed half a year of operation through the summer peak.

• Annual generation (modelled P50): 431,600 kWh (including bifacial rear-side uplift)
• Measured bifacial uplift (first summer): +9.2% rear-side vs monofacial model
• Self-consumption ratio: 98.7%
• Annual electricity cost saving (year 1): £90,600 at 21p/kWh
• CO₂ avoided: 60.4 tonnes CO₂e
• Capital cost: £527,000 (ex-VAT)
• Full Expensing tax relief (25% CT): £131,750 in year of expenditure
• Net capital cost after tax: £395,250
• Simple payback (pre-tax): 5.8 years
• Post-tax payback: 4.4 years
• Project IRR (25-year DCF): 17%

Scope 2 and tenant outcomes

The operator’s corporate net zero 2030 commitment covers Scope 1 and 2 emissions from directly operated facilities. The solar installation reduces market-based Scope 2 by 431,600 kWh annually — approximately 60.4 tonnes CO₂e — contributing approximately 8% of the total Scope 2 reduction required to meet the 2030 target.

For tenants: two tenants have cited the REGO documentation in formal procurement sustainability questionnaires. One tenant — a Midlands-based financial services firm — cited the improved sustainability credentials of their hosted IT infrastructure in their own annual sustainability report, noting it as a supply chain Scope 3 improvement. The operator’s account management team has reported that the solar installation has become a differentiating factor in competitive colocation sales conversations with sustainability-conscious prospects.

Reference availability

DC-BHM-006 is available as a reference for managed services colocation facilities, multi-tenant sustainability frameworks, NGED West Midlands grid connection, bifacial module specification, and Birmingham / West Midlands location benchmarks. Reference calls arranged under NDA.