Climate change concerns many of today’s landlords, and using a solar energy system to warm a building’s water can go a long way towards addressing a potential tenant’s concerns. Whether you own commercial property, industrial buildings or residential apartments, your potential clientele has been hearing for a long time that we all need to do more to protect the planet and move towards green energy sources. Switching to green energy sources where possible speaks volumes about your ethics to potential renters.

Green credentials aside, there are lots of reasons to install solar panels. You can cut your gas and electric bills significantly by becoming less dependent on outside energy sources to heat your water. You can use these savings to add to your profits, make you more competitive by passing savings on to your tenants, or both.

Solar heated water is not a new idea, of course. The idea of using solar energy to heat water have around us since the mid 1800s. However, while the technology has come a long way since then, until recently it was somewhat unreliable in cold and cloudy locations. And this is where energy bills are at their highest. The recent development of vacuum sealed solar heating tubes, however, are allowing more people to switch to a solar energy system.

The cylindrical shape of solar heating tubes allows them to be positioned so that some of their surface constantly faces towards the sun, allowing the cylinders to absorb the sun’s rays for much longer than their predecessors, the flat solar panels. As they are able to harness the sun’s energy more efficiently, they are offer a much more reliable alternative to solar panels, heating water even when the day is overcast or cold. The fact that they are vacuum sealed increases their efficiency even more as vacuums provide the optimal conditions for insulating the heat source. Consequently less energy is wasted. The inside of the tube can be blazing hot, while the outside of the tube, insulated by the vacuum, remains cool to the touch. This leads to much more of the solar power being retained and used to heat the building’s water.

Your building’s boiler system or hot water heater uses up a significant chunk of the electricity and/or gas used in your building. You can lower your energy bills and those of your tenants significantly by installing solar heating tubes and using the sun’s energy to your advantage. You only need purchase and install the solar heating tubes once, after that the savings will last forever.

This is the best time to begin using a green energy source like solar panels. Governments all over the world are now offering incentives to incourage landlords to install solar heating tubes which generates sustainable, renewable energy sources. Various countries will even give you a grant towards the installation of your solar heating tubes or solar panels. At some point, green energy is going to be the order of the day for all building owners. It’s best to get on board now, while the government will help defray some of the costs.

Craig Axelrod is VP of Business Development for EmmyEnergy.com, a Long Island solar power system operation offering solar heating tubes solar energy systems & clean energy products in the Northeast.