About

About Renegade Solar

I'm Ashley Merritt and I run Renegade Solar from North Manchester. I've been working as an electrician for over twenty years. Most of that has been commercial - factories, offices, industrial sites - though there's always been a fair amount of domestic alongside it.

Between 2016 and 2018 I was working in the Channel Islands, mostly on high-end mansions and apartments. The work there ranged from loft conversions, kitchens and extensions through to bigger commercial and industrial jobs, including the Jersey Recycling Centre. When I came back to Manchester in 2018 I set up Renegade Electrical, and the solar side of the business has grown out of that since.

We started doing more solar around three or four years ago, when the maths started properly working for most homes. Panels are cheaper than they used to be, electricity isn't, and batteries had got good enough to be worth fitting. We mainly use DMEGC and Trina Vertex panels - they hold up well on Manchester roofs, which we can say with some confidence from monitoring data on customers' systems over the years.

Alongside the solar we do battery installations and the related electrical work for extensions, loft conversions and renovations across Greater Manchester.

The electrical background still runs through the business. In Bowlee, Heywood, we designed, installed and commissioned the complete electrical installation for a new-build home, including internal and external lighting and smart controls for lights, plugs, switches, cameras and thermostats. Solar was planned for a later phase, so the consumer unit, controls and cable routes could be considered before the house was finished. There is more detail in the Bowlee new-build electrical case study.

You don't have to be worried about climate change to want solar, though plenty of our customers are. For most homes the appeal is the bills - a typical semi with a south-facing roof can take a fair bit off electricity costs with a panel-and-battery setup, and the system pays back over time.

Working Locally

Customers deal directly with me, and the installation work is completed by our in-house Renegade Solar team. I stay involved in the survey, design, electrical installation, commissioning and aftercare. Specialist scaffolding is the only part we subcontract.

The team fits solar panels around rooflights, on slate roofs and across flat roofs broken up by roof lanterns and parapets. Those awkward layouts need careful measuring, sensible access and a panel arrangement designed for the actual Manchester property rather than an empty rectangle on a screen.

We sponsor Blackley Lions FC, donate to The Lighthouse Project (a small charity in Middleton that supports families across North Manchester) every Christmas, and worked with the University of Manchester on a mobile solar education unit designed to travel around schools and community events. At Christmas 2025, Renegade again offered help with tripping fuse boards and power cuts to M24 residents, with no call-out fee for pensioners. That was the third year we had run the Christmas offer.

More on all of that in our Social Value Policy.

For a quote, get in touch.