Public Funding for Bipv Limited

**TUPROOFS** will create an energy generating highly insulating and easy to install, quality controlled, factory made roof that generates enough renewable (zero carbon) energy to power the home and export excess electricity while preventing energy loss upwards through the roof. TUPROOFS is a key breakthrough product enabling an active solar roof where energy yield repays the capital costs plus dividend, attractive to owner/occupiers/private and social landlords, driving widespread employment and COVID-19 recovery. It also conforms to the Construction Innovation Hub platform and will be compatible with other elements being developed in the technical area. We expect TUPROOFS roofs will become one of the elements of the Midland High Growth \[MHG\] initiative being promoted by the West Midlands Combined Authorities, a group of local authorities with the aim of applying deep retrofit to dwellings across their area. It will help to eliminate fuel poverty while making homes more comfortable and driving energy use down to energy neutrality and zero carbon. ACTL and the project partners are proud to be associated with the MHG initiative where senior executives from several large local companies and charities are being seconded to the initiative to improve life and living standards across the Midlands and drive industrial recovery from COVID-19 in a socially inclusive and green way. We are excited that by delivering deep retrofit initially in the Midlands where we can help demonstrate the benefits. We believe the systems will be diffused across the UK and ultimately deliver deep retrofit to the 25 million homes in the UK that currently buy approximately £34 Billion worth of energy when their net energy purchase could be around zero. If widely adopted the number of people employed by deep retrofit will be in the 100s of thousands and help the UK emerge from the COVID-19 crisis. At the same time we'll prepare the ground work for new off-site manufacturing in new factories with new rapid on-site deep retrofit construction technologies bringing new employment into areas where there was already high unemployment even before the pandemic. The project will develop and install two prototype TUPROOFS roofs during the 9 months of the project to demonstrate their efficiency and efficacy and work with partners Hadley Group, NCC, MHG, BIPVco and Go Monitor to prepare outline designs for the creation of large scale production as the project successfully demonstrates the benefits of the TUPROOFS roof.

BIPVCo is a spin off enterprise of Swansea University. In 2008 a project was started involving Swansea University and a number of indsutrial partners to investigate the feasability of integrated photovoltaics into steel substrates and components. In 2013 the project was spun out and BIPVCo was registered to take forward the development and commercialisation of building integrated photovoltaics. The company is now based on the Shotton Works in the PV accelarator, a purpose built manufacturing unit. The project is now in the final stages of research and development and will be commercially active in September of 2014. The business currently consists of six members of staff. Two employees have come from TATA Steel, and between them have over 80 years experience in the steel manufacturing industry. Two employees are ex Sharp solar employees and between them have over 20 years of solar manufacturing experience. The project director has worked in the building components industry for over 25 years and has a vast wealth of experience and contacts in the industry. The sixth member of the team is a Chester University graduate who joined the business in November 2013 on a 20 week business placement. He has since been offered a further 20 week placement with a view to a permanent position in the future. The company has developed a highly innovative way of encapsulating photovoltaic modules into steel roofing products. The team are now in the final stages of manufacturing development and product testing with a view to bringing a commercially available product to market in 2015.