1MW RiteWay Food Markets

Your Eco has delivered a 1,003 kWp rooftop solar system across four buildings at Riteway's Pasea Estate in Road Town, Tortola — the British Virgin Islands' first commercial-scale renewable energy installation, and the largest rooftop array in the Caribbean. The system generates 1.80 GWh of clean electricity a year, cutting the site's electricity bill by $589,293 and its carbon emissions by 705 tonnes annually.

• 1.00 MWp installed DC power

• 1.80 GWh annual usable solar production

• 705.25 t annual CO₂ emissions saved

• 32,392 annual equivalent trees planted

• 2,006 PV modules | 7 inverters | 1,008 optimisers

• Performance Ratio: 89% | Annual specific production: 1,794 kWh/kWp

The challenge

Riteway is one of the British Virgin Islands' largest food distribution businesses — and the territory's single largest consumer of electricity. Refrigeration runs around the clock. Warehousing, chill storage and distribution do not pause, and neither does the meter.

That would be an expensive operation anywhere. In the BVI it is punishing. Electricity is billed at $0.35 per kWh, placing the islands among the twenty most expensive electricity markets in the world. Riteway's annual electricity expenditure with the BVI Electricity Corporation (BVIEC) runs to $2.35 million, of which around $1.5 million is spent at Pasea Estate alone.

Cost is only half the problem. BVIEC generation is almost entirely diesel-fired, which means Riteway's largest controllable overhead is indexed to global fuel markets it has no influence over. Every diesel price spike lands directly on the P&L. And in a territory where grid capacity is tight and hurricane season is an annual certainty, dependence on a single imported fuel is a resilience question as much as a financial one.

“Today marks one of the most significant milestones in RTW’s 65-year history. The commissioning of the Caribbean’s largest rooftop solar installation reflects our commitment to innovation, sustainability, and responsible corporate leadership. We are proud to partner with BVIEC and YourEco in delivering a project that benefits our business, our community, and the future of the Virgin Islands.”

Jackie McDonagh
Managing Director
Roadtown Wholesale Trading Ltd.

Riteway needed to take a meaningful share of its demand off the grid permanently — without interrupting a live distribution and cold-chain operation, and to an engineering standard that would survive a Category 5 hurricane.