Midsummer installs invisible solar roof on Swedish house

Thin film-based solar panels shaped to follow the curves of a popular Swedish roof tile brand and blend in with the surroundings have been successfully installed on a roof of a town house outside Stockholm.

The integrated solution is named Bender SunWave, after the tile brand Bender Palema and its manufacturer Benders. According to Benders, Palema is the best-selling roof tile in Sweden since the 1960s.

Swedish solar technology company Midsummer partnered with Benders to develop the solar panels and customised them to follow the two s-curves that shape the Palema roof tile.

At the product launch in May 2019, Midsummer said it would start taking orders immediately and begin deliveries in October.

Midsummer makes the thin-film solar roof tiles at its newly opened production facility in Jarfalla, north of Stockholm, where the company is based, while Benders markets the product under the Bender SunWave brand.

Being part solar panel and part roof tile, Bender SunWave can be installed on a new or an existing roof, Midsummer said Tuesday announcing the first installation.

“The panels are so inconspicuous that you wouldn’t believe that there are actually solar panels on such an attractive roof”, Benders CEO Ove Bender remarked.

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