Equestrian solar specialists, not generalists
We are a UK MCS-certified solar company that focuses on equestrian properties, livery yards, riding schools, studs, competition yards and private stables. That focus is deliberate. A yard is not a warehouse with horses in it: it is a site whose biggest bills fall after dark and in winter, whose roofs range from a clear modern American barn to a lightweight or asbestos-clad old block, and whose planning status is almost never what owners assume. A generalist installer sizes to your roof and quotes a payback. We size to your real electrical load from your half-hourly meter data, we are honest that a yard's evening- and winter-heavy demand is the mirror image of when panels generate, and we design the array, and the battery, around the realities of a working yard. That is the difference between a system that looks good on a spreadsheet and one that actually runs your ménage lights after dark.
We design around the load, not the roof
The single thing most solar quotes get wrong on a yard is treating it like a house or a daytime commercial roof. Arena floodlights from October to March, the solarium, wash-bay hot water, horse walkers and overnight frost protection form a load profile that peaks exactly when the sun is weakest. So we start from your consumption, not your roof area: we model your real usage, size generation to the daytime base load, and add battery storage where its job is to shift midday sun into the evening lighting peak. We are equally honest about where a battery does not pay, and where a simpler export-and-diversion design, sending surplus to hot water, an EV or a horsebox charger, is the better answer. A self-consumed unit avoids about 26p of import against roughly 12p for export, and that maths, not an export tariff, is what we build the design around.
We know the planning nuance
Most yard owners believe their stables are 'agricultural' and therefore automatically covered. In planning law they usually are not: under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 only grazing counts as agriculture, so a ridden, liveried or schooled yard is equestrian and typically sui generis, and the agricultural permitted-development rights that farms use do not apply. Rooftop solar has its own route, GPDO Part 14 Class J for a non-domestic building, and we design and document to it, confirming the building is lawful and handling the glare prior-approval. Where a project falls outside permitted development, a ground-mounted array, a Green Belt site, a listed stable, or a building put up without permission, we tell you before you spend anything and set out the proper planning strategy. We would rather lose the quote than sell you an array you cannot lawfully install.
We work around a live yard and the horses
You cannot switch a yard off. Horses need turning out, mucking out, feeding and settling on their own schedule, and rooftop work has to fit around them, not the other way round. We plan access, scaffolding and deliveries to keep yards, schools and turnout routes usable, we keep noise and disturbance away from stabled and nervous horses, and we schedule the one genuinely disruptive step, the final grid connection, for a quiet window. On older roofs we survey for asbestos and structural capacity first, because a pre-2000 barn roof is often asbestos-cement that must be stripped and re-clad before any panel goes on, and many stable roofs are lightweight and need an engineer's sign-off. Getting that right protects your horses, your building and your warranty.
Accreditations and warranties that mean something
We are certified by the Microgeneration Certification Scheme (MCS) for solar installations, which is what makes your system eligible for the Smart Export Guarantee, and we are NICEIC-registered for the electrical work, with RECC and TrustMark consumer protection. Tier-one panels carry a 25-year performance warranty, inverters are warranted and replaced once in the system's life, and on top of the manufacturer cover our workmanship carries a ten-year insurance-backed guarantee, so the cover survives even if a contractor does not. Every certification number appears on your quote so you can verify it, and our proposals are fixed price: the survey surfaces the grid-connection, structural and roof-condition costs up front, so what you sign is what you pay.
Why yards trust a specialist
Because we speak the language of a working yard and we do not oversell. We know why your evening arena lights, not your roof size, decide the design; why a battery matters more here than on a daytime commercial roof; and why the planning answer differs between a trading livery, a riding school and a private home stable. We map the funding you can actually claim, the Annual Investment Allowance for a trading yard, 0% VAT for a home install until 31 March 2027, the Smart Export Guarantee and the business-rates exemption, and we are straight that there is no government grant specifically for stable solar. In a sector where more than 250 riding schools have closed since 2018, an honest, specialist approach to your biggest controllable cost is worth more than a glossy pitch. Read how the numbers work on the cost guide, or see whether solar suits your yard on the is solar worth it page.