What would a 210 kWp array produce in Nottingham?

Yes. At 859 kWh per kWp a year, a 210 kWp array on a Nottingham roof models at around 180,000 kWh. What changes the answer is how much of that the building uses during opening hours rather than exports. Source: EU PVGIS v5.2, SARAH3, 10 degree pitch, 14 percent system loss.

Do we need planning permission for solar on a commercial building in Nottingham?

Usually not a full application. In England, panels on the roof of a non-domestic building are permitted development under Class J of Part 14 of the General Permitted Development Order, with no capacity cap since December 2023. Above 50 kW, which covers most commercial arrays, you must first apply to Nottingham for a determination on prior approval of the design and appearance, in particular glare on neighbouring land. On a flat roof panels may stand no more than 1 metre above the roof and must sit at least 1 metre from its edge, and listed buildings and scheduled monuments are excluded. See our planning permission guide for the detail.

Does solar help a Nottingham landlord meet MEES?

It can. A non-domestic EPC is an asset rating, and on-site generation counts in the calculation, so an array usually lifts the score. Let property in England and Wales must be EPC E or better today. The government's interim response of 18 June 2026 proposes EPC B, where cost effective, from 2031 for let buildings over 1,000 m², and drops the EPC C step once planned for 2027. How far solar moves a particular building depends on its fabric and services, which is why the EPC assessor models it before anything is fitted.

Which network operator handles the connection in Nottingham?

Capacity varies street by street and only National Grid Electricity Distribution can answer it for your connection. We ask early, because an export-limited offer changes the design rather than ending the scheme, and most commercial buildings use most of what they generate anyway.

Commercial building solar panels in Nottingham

An office or store in Nottingham buys most of its electricity between eight in the morning and six at night, which is when a roof array generates. What decides a scheme is the roof covering, the parapet height and the plant layout, which is why the survey happens on the roof rather than from a satellite image.

859 kWh per kWp a year at this latitude, so a 210 kWp array models at about 180,000 kWh. Source: EU PVGIS v5.2, SARAH3, 10 degree pitch, 14 percent system loss.

Book a roof survey in Nottingham

Drawing Nottingham commercial roof

Roof 60 x 32 m, 1,920 m²

Array 210 kWp, east-west

Yield 180,000 kWh/yr

Scale 1:400 / Rev A / NG7

Illustrative layout for a flat commercial roof of this size, with plant, shade and access kept clear. Your own figures come from the roof survey.

299,790: people in the Nottingham built-up area (ONS Census 2021)
2,540: office properties on the rating list in Nottingham (VOA, March 2025)
2,940: retail properties, 100 of them large-format (VOA, March 2025)
0: named commercial rooftop schemes on the planning record nearby (REPD, Q1 2026)

The commercial edge of a Midlands town, a supermarket and low offices with rooftop solar — Commercial stock of the kind we survey across East Midlands. Generated illustration, not a named site.

Solar for offices and retail across Nottinghamshire

How much sun a Nottingham roof gets

Modelled irradiation here is 1,098 kWh per square metre a year on a low-tilt array, which works out at 859 kWh for every kWp installed (EU PVGIS v5.2, SARAH3, 10 degree pitch, 14 percent system loss). That is about 3 percent below the mean across the towns we cover, so the case here rests more on daytime consumption than on raw generation.

The rating list for Nottingham

The Valuation Office Agency's rating list puts 2,540 office and 2,940 retail properties in Nottingham, covering about 648,000 and 669,000 square metres of floorspace respectively. By office stock the district sits in the top tenth of the 318 districts in England and Wales; by retail stock it sits in the top quarter of the 318 districts in England and Wales.

The big roofs are in the 100 large-format retail units, superstores and retail warehouses in the district, about 296,000 square metres of floorspace under largely single storey roofs.

The same list carries 400 hotel, leisure and assembly properties in the district. Leisure centres and hotels run seven days a week, which puts weekend generation to use that an office would export.

Source: Valuation Office Agency, Non-domestic rating: business floorspace, 31 March 2025 (published December 2025), counts and floorspace by special category code and local authority district, England and Wales.

The built-up area holds about 299,790 people, a city-scale centre with office quarters, shopping centres and out-of-town retail parks (ONS Census 2021 built-up areas).

We arrange surveys across the NG postcode area, starting from NG7.

FIG. 1 What a Nottingham roof makes, month by month

Jul produces 6.3 times what Dec does on the same roof. A 210 kWp array here models at about 180,000 kWh across the year, but it arrives unevenly, which is why we size against your summer daytime load and then look at whether storage is worth adding for the shoulder months.

Monthly figures as a table

Month	kWh per kWp	210 kWp array
Jan	22	4,620
Feb	37	7,770
Mar	70	14,700
Apr	100	21,000
May	118	24,780
Jun	115	24,150
Jul	119	24,990
Aug	104	21,840
Sep	78	16,380
Oct	48	10,080
Nov	28	5,880
Dec	19	3,990

Source: EU PVGIS v5.2

FIG. 2 Nottingham against the rest of Nottinghamshire

Newark874
Retford869
West Bridgford864
Nottingham859
Arnold857
Mansfield852
Worksop842

Nottingham ranks 4 of 7 towns we cover in Nottinghamshire on modelled yield, against a national mean of 886 kWh per kWp. The county runs from 842 to 874, a spread of 32 kWh per kWp. Within Nottinghamshire that difference is small enough to ignore: where the building sits is not what decides this scheme, your consumption pattern is.

Bars are zero based, so length is proportional to the figure. Where a county is flat, that is the finding: location is not the lever, consumption is. Source: EU PVGIS v5.2, modelled per town

Grid connection through National Grid Electricity Distribution

Connections around Nottingham are handled by National Grid Electricity Distribution, which sets the export limit for the site. Above 3.68 kW per phase the connection runs under G99, so the export limit is agreed in advance rather than assumed. Where the local network is constrained, an export-limited connection usually still makes the scheme work, because a commercial building uses most of what the roof makes during the working day.

Across Nottinghamshire the planning database records 164 solar schemes totalling 3700 MW, of which 35 are operational (REPD Q1 2026).

All solar on record near NG7

Every scheme in this postcode district in the government's Renewable Energy Planning Database, Q1 2026, ground and roof mounted, commercial or not. None of them is ours. Together they are a fair guide to how the local network has been treating export applications.

Scheme	Operator	Capacity	Mounting	Status
Willow Road - Roof mounted solar panels	AC Gill Limited	0.35 MW	Roof	Operational
Games Workshop Euro Hub, Willow Road - Solar Panels	Games Workshop	0.26 MW	Roof	Awaiting Construction
Madison Court, Derwent Way - Solar Panels	Bluesky Student Madison Gardens Limited	0.18 MW	Roof	Awaiting Construction
Lenton Lane - Solar Panels	Big Yellow Self Storage Limited	0.16 MW	Roof	Application Submitted
JK Foods UK, Bull Close Road - Solar Panels	JK Foods UK Limited	0.31 MW	Roof	Awaiting Construction
Redfield Road - Solar Panels	Private Developer	0.45 MW	Roof	Awaiting Construction

Book the survey

Send us the postcode

Tell us where the building is, roughly how big the roof is, and whether you own it or lease it. We come back with what it can carry, what it would generate against your consumption, and the three ways to pay for it.

Lenzie Consulting Ltd arranges the survey and passes your details to our MCS-certified installation partner so they can quote.

Your name Company Email Phone Site postcode Building type Your interest in the building Roof area Annual electricity spend What are you looking at?

Anything we should know about the roof?

We pass your details to our MCS-certified installation partner so they can quote. Read the privacy notice.

Questions about solar in Nottingham

What would a 210 kWp array produce in Nottingham?: Yes. At 859 kWh per kWp a year, a 210 kWp array on a Nottingham roof models at around 180,000 kWh. What changes the answer is how much of that the building uses during opening hours rather than exports. Source: EU PVGIS v5.2, SARAH3, 10 degree pitch, 14 percent system loss.
Do we need planning permission for solar on a commercial building in Nottingham?: Usually not a full application. In England, panels on the roof of a non-domestic building are permitted development under Class J of Part 14 of the General Permitted Development Order, with no capacity cap since December 2023. Above 50 kW, which covers most commercial arrays, you must first apply to Nottingham for a determination on prior approval of the design and appearance, in particular glare on neighbouring land. On a flat roof panels may stand no more than 1 metre above the roof and must sit at least 1 metre from its edge, and listed buildings and scheduled monuments are excluded. See our planning permission guide for the detail.
Does solar help a Nottingham landlord meet MEES?: It can. A non-domestic EPC is an asset rating, and on-site generation counts in the calculation, so an array usually lifts the score. Let property in England and Wales must be EPC E or better today. The government's interim response of 18 June 2026 proposes EPC B, where cost effective, from 2031 for let buildings over 1,000 m², and drops the EPC C step once planned for 2027. How far solar moves a particular building depends on its fabric and services, which is why the EPC assessor models it before anything is fitted.
Which network operator handles the connection in Nottingham?: Capacity varies street by street and only National Grid Electricity Distribution can answer it for your connection. We ask early, because an export-limited offer changes the design rather than ending the scheme, and most commercial buildings use most of what they generate anyway.

Nearby

All Nottinghamshire locations