Supermarket Giant Sainsbury's Boasts Largest Solar Array In Europe

Sainsbury's reveals total Solar installation figures for almost 170 of it's stores.

Over 69,500 solar panels have, to date been installed on the roofs of 169 Sainsbury's stores nationwide. The company now has 16MW of solar capacity across the 169 of its 572 UK supermarkets, collectively managing the largest solar array in Europe.

When combined, the solar panels would cover 24 football pitches, reducing the overall carbon emissions of the company by approximately 6.800 tonnes a year. How much they have actually spent on this, Sainsbury's would not say but according to Business Green, a spokeswoman from the company said that the solar roll-out is set to continue as the company looks to make good on its '20 by 20 Sustainability Plan', that contains the pledges to reduce operational carbon emissions by 30 per cent against 2050 levels by 2020.

Justin King, chief executive of Sainsbury's, said : "It makes sense for us - it's good for the environment and for our business and we are actively looking to install more panels." He went on to say that, "Supermarkets have the equivalent of football fields on their roofs, many of them underutilised (and now) is the perfect time to turn that space into something positive.

It is always good to learn of a large commercial operation like Sainsbury's investing in energy efficiency. The fact that they are continuing to re-invest in solar technology is great for the solar industry across the board, as it displays that the company must be seeing a return on their investment, large commercial enterprises being unlikely to continue such a project if no profit was forthcoming.

Furthermore, Sainsbury's have just announced a major programme to install ground source heat pump’s at roughly 100 of its stores, in an effort to curb emissions from heating and cooling. It would be interesting to see the results of a Commercial EPC (Energy Performance Certificate) for one of the supermarket buildings after solar and ground source heating were introduced.

At the moment, it looks like Sainsbury's are set for straight A's and hopefully their sterling efforts to tackle climate change and be a more sustainable and responsible corporate entity, will echo through the commercial sector. As their competition say "Every little helps!"

Post by Paul Patane for Just EPC