Scottish businesses generate almost £20 million of their own electricity each year through small-scale green energy projects.
A report by industry body Scottish Renewables found that an increasing number of Scottish companies were investing in wind turbine, solar panel, hydro and heat pump technologies in order to cut their power bills and reduce their carbon footprint.
The study also found that firms were being persuaded to explore green energy options by the lure of gaining a return on their initial investment through selling power back to the grid.
Scottish Renewables which will hold an exhibition and workshop about on-site renewables at Perth Concert Hall on Thursday said that green energy capacity had tripled in the last five years and now accounted for £19.3m of electricity generation per annum.
Among those who have gone down the renewables road is Stewart Tower Dairy of Stanley a supplier to Harvey Nichols and Gleneagles which installed a single wind turbine this year.
Owner Neil Butler said the device was already starting to pay its way.
“Making ice cream uses a lot of power, for fridges, freezers, compressors, and as we are on a plateau about 300ft up with good wind speeds a turbine seemed to make sense,” he said.
“The benefit for us is not selling power into the grid, but the offset: we are providing almost half the power we need using the turbine and that is saving us enormous amounts when power bills are rising by around 10% a year.
“When you look at that kind of price rise, on-site renewables look very attractive.”
Scottish Renewables policy officer Stephanie Clark said more businesses needed to take up the opportunity that green energy offered.
“It’s not just big companies who are building renewable energy projects but more and more private individuals and businesses are taking their energy needs into their own hands by looking to renewables,” she said.
“We’ve seen farmers use wind power to generate electricity to make ice cream, universities using biomass boilers as a heat supply and minibuses powered by biodiesel. In all of these examples they are managing to do three things: lower their energy costs in the future, reduce their carbon footprint and potentially generate income.”