Your ‘Green’ Complete Fabrication Shop; Energy Efficient and They Can Waterjet Your Parts Almost Guaranteed in 24 Hours
Creedbilt established its reputation manufacturing custom truck bodies, flatbeds, hauler bodies, and toolboxes.Their largest customers, coincidentally, are energy companies here in Arizona, SRP and APS. While the business, more than a half century old, is by all means a very successful full service fabrication shop, complete with an Omax waterjet, what is most amazing is that the business just recently completed a conversion of its building to solar. This is an amazing feat considering the amount of power manufacturing facilities such as theirs consume. Perhaps even more incredible is that the Creed boys, Jeremy and Jason, did nearly all of the installation on their own. Jeremy and Jason Creed are running the business that was started by their grandfather more than a half century ago. Their father was 2nd generation owner of the business, and he has handed over the day-to-day management to Jeremy and Jason. Jeremy says, “Power is a significant expense for a shop like ours. My father has solar on his residence (he is off the grid), and we decided to check into the cost of making our business more environmentally friendly.” The Creeds got quotes on turning the >10,000 square foot facility that they own into a solar powered business. Jeremy says that quotes exceeded $120,000. Being extremely mechanically adept, Jeremy and Jason made the decision to do the conversion on their own. Jeremy says, “We hired engineering consultants for specific areas of expertise and electricians for the electrical hook up, but in the end, we built the solar system for $70,000 in materials and ~$20,000 in our labor.” Today, you can see the solar panels on the Creedbilt facility as you approach. There are 186 panels that sit on top of the building and 4 inverters inside the facility to support the solar system that provides the capability to produce the power needed in a machine shop with heavy equipment for 10 hours per A2Z METALWORKER SW
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48 • May/June 2015