How a Leading Solar Company is Working Toward Carbon Neutral and Zero Waste

Inovateus Solar LLC offers Midwest residential and commercial solar energy customers engineering, procurement, construction management, and maintenance services. Specializing in both rooftop- and ground-mounted solar energy projects, the firm has established over 750 megawatts of solar energy (a one-acre solar farm produces roughly 1 megawatt). Inovateus has helped create solar energy projects that produce enough energy to sustain 65,000 average homes for an entire year.

“We help our customers find the land, design an optimal system to sit on that land, and actually build it. We also do equipment and services supply,” says Tyler Kanczuzewski, Inovateus VP of Sustainability.  “There’s data proving that we are reducing a lot of carbon from going into the atmosphere.”

Inovateus Solar partnered with Schneider Electric to provide Shedd Aquarium’s 265-KW rooftop solar installation, which consists of 913 photovoltaic panels located on the aquarium’s marine mammal pavilion. It is the largest solar installation on any cultural institution in Illinois.

Over the past year, Inovateus Solar’s stewardship team was launched to focus on new sustainability efforts, with the ultimate goal of being operationally carbon neutral. Current efforts are reducing company waste going to landfills, recycling more materials, improving energy efficiencies, and reducing consumption of energy in all facility and job site operations.

“We’re really trying to be an educator about sustainability and renewable energy. We want to tell our story about being more sustainable in our operations and lifestyle and work with partners and vendors that believe in the same things and have the same passions,” Kanczuzewski says. “We’re trying to do more than make a couple bucks. We’re trying to grow clean, sustainable technology and education for a healthier earth.”

The IKEA Perryville 5-MW solar array is one of the largest rooftop projects in North America and features two di­fferent solar module technologies.

While these projects are critical to decarbonizing the electric grid, their construction requires emissions-inducing activity in the form of land use, operating heavy machinery, transporting materials, and generating waste.

In 2019, Inovateus Solar’s stewardship team was launched to focus on new sustainability efforts, with the ultimate goal of being operationally carbon neutral. Efforts include reducing company waste going to landfills, recycling more materials, improving energy efficiencies, and reducing energy consumption in all facility and job site operations.

Inovateus continues to work toward carbon neutrality in its own operations and, in 2024, reached a 70 percent recycling rate. Its efforts in 2025 include fuel-efficient travel and adding solar to the company’s building in South Bend. 

“We’re really trying to be an educator about sustainability and renewable energy. We want to tell our story about being more sustainable in our operations and lifestyle and work with partners and vendors that believe in the same things and have the same passions,” Kanczuzewski says. “We’re trying to do more than make a couple bucks. We’re trying to grow clean, sustainable technology and education for a healthier earth.”