Solar panels for caravan parks, FAQs

Most single-park installs run £45,000-£450,000 fully installed, depending on size. Smaller amenity-block or campsite systems (20-150 kW) start around £22,000-£135,000; larger parks with pools and leisure complexes (200-500 kW) reach £180,000-£450,000; multi-park group roll-outs run into the millions. Cost per kW is typically £750-£950 for systems above 100 kW, falling toward £600/kW above 1 MW. Most installs are fully expensed in year one under the Annual Investment Allowance.

Yes, arguably more than for year-round businesses. Your highest-value electrical loads (pool heating, shower-block hot water, kitchen and bar refrigeration, guest EV charging) peak in the same sunny months when solar generates most, so in-season self-consumption is very high. In the quiet winter you export to the grid under the Smart Export Guarantee. Overlaying the occupancy calendar on the generation curve shows the seasonal match before deciding.

Almost always site-wide. The array is fed into your park's private distribution network so it offsets everything you pay for as operator, pitch pillars, reception, shop, laundry, amenity blocks, pool and lighting, and you keep the saving (or recover it through pitch electricity charges). Per-unit micro-arrays only suit genuinely off-grid pods or sites with no shared roof or ground space. Both are modelled.

In order of value: the swimming pool plant building (biggest single load on most large parks), amenity and shower blocks, reception, shop and restaurant/bar, and entertainment venues. These have large, mostly unshaded roofs and concentrated daytime loads. Where roof space is short, discreet ground-mount between pitches or on unused land works, subject to planning in protected settings.

Yes, and pool heating plus solar is one of the fastest-payback combinations in the sector. Pool pumps, heating and dehumidification are the single largest electrical load on most parks with a pool, and they run hardest in the same months solar generates most. Self-consumption is typically excellent. Pool plant rooms have specific electrical safety zones (BS 7671 Section 702) which the design has to work around.

Yes, it's one of the strongest cases for park solar. Daytime guest charging absorbs solar generation at near-100% self-consumption, and battery storage lets you charge cars from stored solar in the evening without overloading your supply. This often avoids or defers a costly grid upgrade. The Workplace Charging Scheme (OZEV) funds up to 75% of chargepoint cost, capped at £500 per socket from April 2026 (up to 40 sockets). PV, battery and chargers are best designed together.

The 100% Annual Investment Allowance gives up to 25% effective tax relief in year one (solar is a special-rate asset, so use AIA, not full expensing; 50% FYA applies above the £1m cap). The Smart Export Guarantee pays for exported power. The OZEV Workplace Charging Scheme funds EV chargepoints. Green Tourism is a certification scheme, not a grant; on-site solar can count as evidence in an application, so check the scheme's current criteria. Note: the 0% VAT relief on solar is for residential/charity buildings only, it does not apply to commercial park operations.

Sometimes. Many parks have ageing pitch pillars, amenity-block boards or incoming supplies that should be brought up to current BS 7671 Section 708 standard. A full condition survey comes first, and any necessary upgrade can usually be funded inside the same capital envelope as the PV, giving you one coordinated plan rather than two separate jobs.

Usually yes, with sympathetic siting. Rooftop PV on reception, amenity and leisure buildings is the least intrusive option and often falls under permitted development. Where ground-mount is needed in a protected landscape, the visual-impact and landscape assessment the authority expects is required and the National Park or planning authority should be engaged early. Many parks in protected settings already run solar successfully.

Off-grid is where solar-plus-battery really shines. Rather than paying for an expensive DNO grid extension to a remote field, a solar-and-battery micro-system can power shower blocks, lighting and pods directly. Storage is sized to carry the site through cloudy spells and overnight, and a small backup generator can cover worst-case weeks. This is often dramatically cheaper than a grid connection.

From contract to commissioning, typically 4-9 months. The longest item is grid connection, G99 applications take 6-18 months on capacity-constrained rural and coastal networks, so the application is normally submitted immediately after the survey. Physical install is 1-8 weeks depending on size. The disruptive work is best scheduled for the closed or quiet season (typically November-February) so peak-season trading is untouched.

Installation is planned around the calendar. Most parks schedule installation for the closed or quiet off-season (commonly November-March), so guests are unaffected. The only unavoidable outage is the final grid connection (4-8 hours), which is best booked for a low-occupancy period. Rooftop work on amenity and leisure buildings is contained and screened from guest areas.

Typically 5.5-7 years, with pool-heavy leisure buildings at the faster end (5.5 years) and lower-load campsites toward 7. Payback is driven by your in-season self-consumption, your tariff, and how much guest EV charging you can absorb. It can be modelled from half-hourly meter data and the occupancy calendar, with the full model shared so it can be stress-tested.

Yes, and groups get the best economics. A portfolio roll-out (Park Holidays, for example, committed £1.8m to solar across 50+ parks) standardises design, spreads capex, and unlocks group-level PPA or asset-finance frameworks for zero-capex deployment. Each park is assessed individually for roof, grid and planning, then the rest is standardised, with central monitoring and ESG reporting for the board.

Increasingly, yes.Several parks now display live-generation dashboards in reception as a guest talking point.

Owned systems become part of the property and add value. PPA contracts are written so the offtake obligation transfers with the site under standard commercial property law (BRE/Solar Energy UK template). On-site solar is increasingly treated as a value-add by leisure-property valuers like CBRE and Savills, not a complication, so it tends to help a sale rather than hinder it.

Annual O&M visits (electrical inspection, inverter firmware, panel wash if coastal salt or algae build up) plus 24/7 remote monitoring with automated underperformance alerts. Coastal parks benefit from a salt-resistant specification. Typical O&M is £8-£12 per kW per year above 100 kW. Pitch-pillar and amenity-block electrical inspections should follow the intervals set out in IET Guidance Note 3.