Installer refusing to install solar on a concrete tile roof where every tile is screwed in

My installer, who shall not be named to keep things on topic, made it all the way to install day before deciding they weren’t going to touch my roof because every tile is screwed in, and the screws are inaccessible. Not just on the edges, it is every last one of them (I believe for seismic safety), I can see the screws coming through the deck in the attic. This is in California, and I’ve got NEM 2.0 status with this installer + all the permitting and planning is done. Even if I switched installers, I think the problem still remains: how to do this cleanly.

They proposed a $20k additional fix of replacing the concrete tile where the solar will be with asphalt shingle, but that’s not in the budget, and adds another 9 years to where the project has paid for itself. So that’s not a great option.

I can’t figure out a way to remove these tiles cleanly without starting from the top and removing them on down. Doing that will increase the risk of leaks and other problems with the sheer number of holes being disturbed and would warrant replacing the underlayment as well, which in the grand scheme of things, shouldn’t add much expense, but the labor for all of that would be expensive, around $12k.

Another option which might be feasible is to just bash out a tile where the footings need to be installed and use either a membrane type flashing or a metal flashing or both, to substitute the area where the concrete tile used to be. That might result in additional insurance against leaks. The installer offered to rent a lift for the crew to work off of to avoid risking additional damage to the tiles since they are so difficult to replace.

So two questions for this group:

– Has anybody dealt with a similar situation in your professional careers and how did you resolve it?

– Any idea how to efficiently replace any broken concrete tiles when the screws are basically inaccessible? If they were nailed in, no problem, but screws, come on.