Solar on park homes and static caravans

A park home sits on land you almost certainly do not own, under an agreement that usually restricts alterations, on a structure that was not designed to carry a roof load. Each of those is solvable — but the site agreement is the one that decides it, not the engineering.

Ask the site owner first. Before the survey, before the quote, before anything.

A park home usually sits on a pitch under an agreement that restricts alterations, on land owned by someone else. That agreement decides whether this is possible, and no amount of good engineering changes it.

Two other things need establishing before money is spent: whether the roof structure can carry an array — these are transportable buildings, built light — and how permitted development treats a park home, which is a question we have not been able to answer.

The site agreement comes first

Most park home occupancy agreements contain terms about alterations to the home and to the pitch. Many require the site owner’s written consent for anything fixed.

Ask for the specific term. Not “can I have solar” but “which term of the agreement applies, and what would you consent to?” A site owner may refuse a roof-fixed array and accept a free-standing one, and you will not discover that from a flat no.

Get it in writing. Verbal permission from a site manager who leaves is worth nothing when the site changes hands.

Ask about the site licence. Sites operate under a licence from the local authority, and its conditions may bear on what can be placed on a pitch.

The structure

Park homes are built to be transported. The roof structure is sized for that, not for carrying several hundred kilograms of glass and aluminium.

Everything on our structural surveys page applies more strongly here: this is squarely a case where a roof type is “not covered by standard methodologies”, which is one of the conditions MIS 3002 treats as requiring a qualified structural engineer.

Do not accept an assurance based on house experience. An installer who fits arrays to masonry houses every week has no relevant basis for an opinion about a park home roof.

The planning question we could not answer

Class A of Part 14 permits solar on “a dwellinghouse or a block of flats”, or a building within their curtilage. A park home is not obviously a dwellinghouse for these purposes, and we have not established how the permitted development regime treats them.

We are not going to guess. Ask the local planning authority directly, and ask the site owner what the site licence permits. If somebody tells you confidently that no permission is needed, ask what they are relying on.

Why plug-in solar fits well here

Plug-in solar suits this situation better than most:

  • reversible, with no roof penetration — which addresses both the structural and the alterations objections
  • often free-standing or fence-mounted, so it need not touch the home at all
  • portable, which matters if you may move pitches
  • modest cost, proportionate to the modest roof area available anyway

It still needs the site owner’s agreement, and the fire safety and G98 notification considerations still apply.

The economics may be unusually good — or unusually odd

Two features cut in opposite directions.

Park home residents are frequently at home during the day, which pushes self-consumption up — and self-consumption is what decides whether solar pays.

But where the site resells electricity to residents, the unit price and the metering arrangements may differ from an ordinary domestic supply, which changes both what a self-consumed unit is worth and whether export is even possible.

Establish how your electricity is supplied and billed before modelling anything.

A realistic sequence

  1. Read the occupancy agreement, and identify the alterations term.
  2. Ask the site owner in writing, offering a reversible option as an alternative.
  3. Ask the local authority about permitted development and the site licence.
  4. Establish how electricity is supplied and billed to your pitch.
  5. Get a structural opinion from someone who understands park home construction, before any roof-fixed proposal.
  6. Compare a plug-in system honestly against the roof option — for many pitches it is not the compromise it appears.

Sources

  1. Mobile Homes Act 1983 UK Statute Law · Accessed 18 August 2026 · OGL v3.0
  2. The Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015, Schedule 2, Part 14 UK Statute Law · Accessed 17 August 2026 · OGL v3.0

Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

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