JLR installs UK’s largest rooftop solar panel at Engine Manufacturing

Jaguar Land Rover has completed the installation of the UK’s largest rooftop solar panel array at its new state-of-the art Engine Manufacturing Centre at i54 South Staffordshire.

More than 21,000 photovoltaic panels, with a capacity of 5.8MW, have been fixed to the roof of the Engine Manufacturing Centre, with plans to increase this to over 6.3MW by the end of the year. It is estimated that the system will generate more than 30 percent of the Engine Manufacturing Centre’s energy requirements. This is the equivalent to the energy needed to power more than 1,600 homes. The photovoltaic panels will reduce the plant’s CO₂ footprint by over 2,400 tonnes per year.

Trevor Leeks, the Engine Manufacturing Centre’s Operations Director, said, “Our world-class facility showcases the latest sustainable technologies and innovations. The completion of the UK’s largest rooftop solar panel installation here at the Engine Manufacturing Centre is just one example of this.

“As the first manufacturer to win the ‘Responsible Business of the Year’ last year, environmental innovation lies at the heart of Jaguar Land Rover’s business.”

Based at the heart of the UK, the state-of-the-art Engine Manufacturing Centre is the first new plant that Jaguar Land Rover has built from the ground up. The site represents an investment of more than £500 million (Rs 5,006 crore) and will create almost 1,400 new jobs by the time the plant reaches full capacity.

The world-class plant will manufacture the first family of premium, advanced technology engines, Ingenium, to be entirely designed and built in-house by Jaguar Land Rover for exclusive use in the company’s future vehicles. The Jaguar XE, debuting in 2015, will be the first vehicle equipped with these four-cylinder engines. 

The Engine Manufacturing Centre uses cutting-edge heating and lighting systems designed to minimise energy demand through the use of insulated cladding, to maximise daylight through the roof design and to harness natural ventilation through the use of automatic louvers.

Extensive energy monitoring facilities in the plant continually analyse the amount of energy being used and identify opportunities to reduce that energy consumption, for both electricity and natural gas.

Outside of the building, the carmaker plans to create an ecological corridor across the bottom of its site. The corridor will be designed to encourage the natural movement of species from one side of the site to the other.

In addition, there are plans to install features such as boxes, habitat piles, dead wood stumps and insect houses to encourage small mammals, invertebrates, amphibians, bats and birds to the site.

Jaguar Land Rover won Business in the Community’s ‘Responsible Business of the Year 2013’ for placing environmental innovation at the heart of its business strategy, embedding sustainability at every stage of the product development process and all levels of the business.