ZEV is the German acronym for self-consumption associations. With self-consumption, you as a tenant use solar power produced on your own roof. In other words, your landlord installs a solar panel installation and sells the solar power to you and your neighbours on site.
This simplified illustration shows how a ZEV works.
- The solar panels on your roof produce electricity that you and your neighbours use yourselves (self-consumption).
- If the solar panels produce more electricity than the tenants use on site, the excess electricity is fed into the local grid. The ZEV community receives a credit from the local energy supplier for this.
- If the solar installation produces less electricity than you and the other tenants need, you draw the necessary additional electricity from the grid. For this purpose, the ZEV representative selects a suitable electricity product from the local energy supplier, usually from the mid-price segment. Peak and off-peak tariff times will remain the same.
- Every tenant has a smart meter that measures how much electricity they consume. This enables individual billing.
- The ZEV has a grid connection and acts as a customer vis-à-vis the local energy supplier. This means that, as a tenant, you no longer have a direct customer relationship with the local energy supplier.
- The billing of electricity costs is handled by the ZEV representative. They usually delegate this to a billing service provider (e.g. ewz).
Solar power from your own roof is less expensive than electricity from the grid. That’s why a ZEV pays off for everyone involved: As a tenant, you receive cheap, sustainably produced electricity. At the same time, the solar panels become more profitable for property owners.
As a tenant in a building with a ZEV, you use solar power produced directly on your roof. This offers you the following benefits:
- local solar power is cheaper than comparable electricity from the grid.
- Solar power is fair and billed according to consumption.
- You make an active contribution to environmental protection.
In a ZEV, the owner and operator of the solar panel installation is the property owner, represented by the administration. For property owners, a ZEV offers the following benefits:
- Higher returns on the solar panels thanks to optimised self-consumption.
- Reduced amortisation times for solar panels.
- Contribution to environmental protection and support of the Energy Strategy 2050.
A ZEV is a contractual community between multiple parties.
- ZEV representative (owner)
The property owner is generally the owner of the solar panel installation and thus the representative of the ZEV. Property management often handles communication between the contractual parties. - Billing service providers (e.g. ewz)
The billing service provider bills and sends electricity bills on behalf of the ZEV. - ZEV participants (end consumers)
The end consumers in a ZEV are the tenants or leasehold owners. - Local energy supplier
The local energy supplier is your current electricity supplier. When the sun isn’t shining, the energy supplier supplies the ZEV with additional electricity.
As the electricity grid is not used for self-consumption, there are no usage fees. Solar power in a ZEV is therefore cheaper than comparable electricity drawn from the grid without a ZEV.
- The ZEV representative defines the price for the solar power for self-consumption in accordance with the legal requirements (Art. 16 of the Energy Ordinance).
- The solar power usually costs 80 per cent of what the external standard electricity product would cost (in accordance with EnO Art. 16 (1b)).
- The electricity price is recalculated every year as local tariffs change every year. For detailed questions about the calculation, please contact your ZEV representative.
Sample calculation if the electricity product from the grid costs CHF 0.25/kWh (left bar): As a ZEV tenant, you only pay 80% of the actual electricity price for local solar power (middle bar) as part of a ZEV, saving CHF 0.05/kWh. At the same time, the owners benefit: they can cover their costs with the income from the solar power sold locally and amortise the solar panel installation more quickly (right bar).
