AN ELECTRICAL contractor in Perth is capitalising on the popularity of renewable energy by moving into the corporate and domestic markets for solar panels.
Quantum Energy expects to more than treble its turnover to £2 million in the year ahead from £600,000 after increasing its workforce from three to 17 to cope with demand for its services.
The firm, which recently moved from Auchterarder to Perth, has already installed solar panels for Scottish housing associations but is now pushing into new markets.
Clients have so far included construction companies such as Stewart Milne and the firm was recently taken on board as a supplier to Carillion.
Nikki Brooke, who founded the company with Tom MacGillivray in 2007 with a £1,000 grant from Business Gateway, is also looking to pick up more trade on the back of the UK government’s Green Deal, which began last week. Under the deal, homeowners can borrow money to install double glazing, insulation or renewable energy technologies like solar panels and repay the money through their utility bills.
“What we need now is for more people in the industry to get behind the Green Deal,” said Brooke. “That way, the government will have something concrete to promote to the public when it starts to publicise the Green Deal.”
Bob Morrison, an adviser at Business Gateway, which helped the firm push into the renewables sector, added: “Quantum Energy is an example of a company that has diversified and are reaping the rewards.”
