Solar Site Survey Checklist: What an EPC Must Record Before Quoting

Name: Secured Engineers Private Limited — Noida (Delhi NCR)
Address: Supertech, Astralis Supernova, Sector 94, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, 201301, IN
Telephone: +91 70099 85817

22 October 2026 · 5 min read · by Secured Engineers Editorial Team

Title card reading Solar Site Survey Checklist: What an EPC Must Record Before Quoting. — Title card. Not a photograph of a Secured Engineers site.

A solar site survey checklist is the record an EPC must complete before quoting: your bills and connection, the roof or land and its structure, shadows, cable and inverter routes, access and safety, and approvals. Without those fields a quotation is a guess. Below is the full sheet, with how to fill each part and the mistake each field prevents.

Why the survey comes before the price

A per-kW quote given without a survey prices an imagined roof. The cost of a plant moves with the structure, the number of roof blocks, the cable lengths, the interconnection point and the approvals route, and none of those can be read from a bill. A survey also makes bids comparable: when every bidder records the same fields, differences in price trace to scope and not to different assumptions. Use this sheet to check your bidders' surveys, or to brief a surveyor of your own.

The survey sheet

Fill one sheet per roof block or ground area, and one for the electrical connection. The right-hand column says what goes wrong when the field is skipped.

Part	Record	How to fill it	Mistake it prevents
A. Consumer	Name, address, GPS point, contact person, working days and shifts, holidays	Take the GPS point at the roof, not at the gate	Generation estimated for the wrong location or load pattern
A. Bills	Twelve months of bills; units, maximum demand, power factor, tariff category	Copy the bills, do not summarise them	Plant sized from one unusual month
B. Connection	Supply voltage, sanctioned load or contract demand, consumer number, meter location	Read from the latest bill and the agreement	Capacity above what the DISCOM will register
B. Transformer	Rating, impedance, loading at peak, age, make, spare capacity	Read the nameplate; photograph it	Transformer overloaded by solar export
B. DG set	Rating, changeover arrangement	Note the changeover type	Solar back-feeding the DG during an outage
C. Roof	Type (RCC, metal sheet, asbestos, other), age, condition, slope, orientation, usable area	Sketch with dimensions; mark north	Mounting chosen for a roof that cannot carry it
C. Structure	Purlin size and spacing, sheet thickness, truss type, design load allowance if known	Ask for the original structural drawing; if none, photograph connections	Overload or leaks after installation
C. Obstructions	Skylights, ventilators, ducts, AC units, water tanks, parapets, stacks	Mark each on the sketch with height	Area counted that is in shadow
D. Shading	Nearby buildings, trees, chimneys, planned construction	Record heights and distances; note any future block	Generation falling short of the estimate
E. Routing	Inverter location, cable route and length to the panel, tie-in point, earthing pit space	Walk the route; measure it	Cable cost and voltage drop underestimated
F. Access and safety	Roof access, fall-protection points, crane access, material storage, working hours, shutdown windows	Ask the plant manager, not the contractor	Delays and rework from access and permits
G. Environment	Dust, oil mist, corrosion, salt air, bird or monkey nuisance, water source for cleaning	Note the source and the season	Soiling losses and cleaning that nobody budgeted
H. Approvals	DISCOM contact, net-metering rules known, electrical inspector requirement, building owner consent, fire considerations	List what the consumer holds already	A plant built that cannot be connected

Notes on the fields that matter most

Usable area, not paper area

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy's rooftop FAQ gives about 10 sq. m of shadow-free area per kW. Measure what is left after skylights, vents, access paths and shadows, and mark it on a drawing. Use the shadow-free area calculator for a first check, and a proper shadow analysis before design.

Roof structure and loading

Solar adds dead load and, on an open roof, wind uplift. Wind loads in India are read from the National Building Code and the relevant part of IS 875, the code for design loads. The survey should not decide structural adequacy, but it should collect what a structural engineer needs: sheet thickness, purlin size and spacing, age and corrosion. The roof load calculator gives a first estimate of the added load. Where a record is missing, say so on the sheet and make a structural check a condition of the quotation.

Connection and approvals

Record the sanctioned load or contract demand, because net-metering limits are tied to them; the sanctioned-load calculator shows the headroom. The central rules raised the net-metering limit to 500 kW in 2021, and the state commission fixes the detail, as the Ministry of Power's year-end review records. Also ask the installer which ALMM position the project falls under; the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy's O.M. of 4 August 2026 sets the rules for modules and cells, as noted in our glossary entry on ALMM.

Photographs and documents to attach

Photographs: each roof block from two corners, the roof surface close-up, any damage, the transformer nameplate, the meter and the incoming panel, the proposed inverter space and the cable route.
Drawings: a site plan, a roof plan with dimensions and obstructions, the single-line diagram of the plant's electrical system if available, and any structural drawing.
Documents: twelve months of bills, the connection agreement, any previous solar or electrical approvals, and the building owner's consent if the roof is not yours.

Using the sheet to compare quotations

Ask each bidder to return the same sheet with its quotation. Look for blanks: a bidder that has not recorded the structure or the shadow situation has not surveyed. Look also for assumptions, such as "roof strength as per client", which place the risk on you. Our guide on comparing solar EPC quotes shows how to line items up once the survey is common. The published C&I price band of ₹24,000 to 32,000 per kW excluding GST is only a starting point until a survey fixes the scope.

Running the survey on the day

Do the paperwork first and the roof second. Start in the electrical room with the nameplates, the meter and the single-line diagram, because that tells you what the plant can connect to. Then walk the cable route from the roof to the panel, and only then go up. Take a person from the maintenance team with you; they know which sheets leak, where the unrecorded cable ducts run and which areas are closed during production. Photograph before you measure, and record the date and time so shadows can be read later. At the end, read the sheet back to the plant manager and ask what is missing. Anything still blank becomes an open item in the quotation, with a name against it.

How Secured Engineers helps

We design in-house and file Fire NOC, CEIG and DISCOM net-metering applications in-house, so the survey records what those filings need. MEPF and solar can sit under one contract. We work from offices in Noida (Delhi NCR) and Ludhiana, with 535+ projects across 18+ states and 89.77% repeat clients.

To have a survey done, or to have your own filled sheet reviewed against a quotation, send it through our RFQ page. You can also see our solar EPC service, message us on WhatsApp, call +91 70099 85817, or ask for a free proposal.

Frequently asked

What should a solar site survey record?

At minimum: the consumer's bills and connection details (voltage, sanctioned load, transformer, DG set), the roof or land with type, area, structure and obstructions, shadows, the inverter and cable route, access and safety arrangements, site environment, and the approvals the consumer already holds. Photographs and dimensioned sketches support each field.

Can an EPC quote without a site survey?

It can give a budget range, but not a firm price. The cost depends on roof structure, number of roof blocks, cable lengths and the interconnection point, none of which appear on a bill. Treat a firm quotation given without a survey as a risk, because the gap will return as a variation.

How much roof area does solar need per kW?

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy's rooftop FAQ gives about 10 sq. m of shadow-free area per kW, and we plan on about 100 sq.ft per kW. Usable area is usually lower than paper area because of skylights, vents, access paths and shadows, so measure and mark what is actually free.

Who checks whether the roof can carry the plant?

A structural engineer should, using the survey data: sheet thickness, purlin size and spacing, age and corrosion, and any original drawing. The survey collects that evidence and flags missing records. Make the structural check a stated condition of the quotation, so that the risk does not default to the roof owner.

Why record the sanctioned load on a solar survey?

Net-metering capacity is usually tied to sanctioned load or contract demand under the state commission's rules, so it caps the size your DISCOM will register. The central rules set the net-metering limit at 500 kW, and the state fixes the details. Recording the figure early avoids designing a plant that cannot be connected.

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