Renewable Energy Structural Engineering

The technology on a renewable project is rarely the part that fails. The structure beneath it is: the roof that has to carry an array for twenty-five years, the foundation that has to resist overturning rather than bearing, the plinth that cannot tolerate the settlement its neighbour can.

We keep our scope to the structural and civil engineering and say so plainly, because a client who thinks their engineer is also doing the electrical design and the grid connection has a gap in the team that nobody has priced. What we sign off, we sign off completely.

Wind and snow loading is where most rooftop assessments go wrong, and it is governed by BS EN 1991-1-3 and 1991-1-4 with BRE Digest 489 (2014) for rooftop PV. An assessment that quietly uses the wrong load case produces a number that reads fine and means nothing.