QLD: Q&A Who is responsible for cleaning solar panels on a townhouse roof?

This article is about who is responsible for cleaning solar panels on a townhouse roof in a body corporate.

Question: I have solar panels on the roof, and we have a pigeon problem. Who is responsible for cleaning solar panels on a townhouse roof?

Answer: Could you agree on a percentage payment with the body corporate based on how much roof your panels occupy?

Owners are responsible for any upgrades they undertake to their property. Assuming the solar panels aren’t an original feature, you are responsible for the totality of their costs in perpetuity – that means not just the original installation, but the ongoing maintenance of the panels and their removal if the body corporate needs access to the roof.

So, while the body corporate is likely still responsible for the roof (I’m assuming you are in a building format property from your description) they can reasonably have the position that in order to clean the roof they need full access to it which requires you to remove the panels on a temporary basis. As this is something you probably don’t want to do, it seems reasonable for the body corporate to say it won’t clean your roof.

Perhaps more nuanced arguments could be made than this. Could you agree on a percentage payment with the body corporate based on how much roof your panels occupy? Maybe you can see what the body corporate says, but why would the body corporate be happy only cleaning a portion of its roof? If the droppings damage the roof or the complex’s appearance, is the body corporate obliged to step in to rectify the common property? Probably, but in that case, they could also require the removal of the panels to rectify the roof.

On a more practical basis, perhaps you should talk to the body corporate about resolving the bird problem. Maybe you could pay for the cleaning, and the body corporate will put some spikes on your roof to keep the birds away. Speak to a pest controller and see what they think. 

More generally, questions around solar panels are going to become an increasingly important topic for body corporates as larger numbers of people install them. Current regulations broadly favour allowing owners to add solar panels, but owners must also be conscious of flow on issues like this. The arguments here aren’t necessarily new – in concept, solar panels are similar to air conditioners installed over common property, which also require moving from time to time at the owner’s cost, much to their chagrin. However, the costs of taking panels on and off a roof will exceed the removal of an air conditioner, so the problems are likely to be multiplied. Owners need to think through the concept of full responsibility before undertaking this kind of installation. The inclination is to think you are only responsible for the panels and their maintenance, but you also need to consider their impact on common property, which can be harder to visualise and budget for. We probably don’t know all the answers for now, but seeing how these issues pan out over the next few years will be interesting.

The Commissioner’s office has recently supplied an excellent guide on solar panels that is well worth reading: Solar infrastructure in community titles schemes.

William Marquand
Tower Body Corporate
E: [email protected]
P: 07 5609 4924

This post appears in Strata News #724.

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