14 DAY TRIAL // Multinational automotive company Jaguar Land Rover has recently announced the completion of a massive solar panel array on the rooftop of a new Engine Manufacturing Center located at i54 South Staffordshire.
The clean energy generating installation comprises over 21,000 photovoltaic panels, and Jaguar Land Rover maintains that it is the largest of its kind to have until now been built in the United Kingdom, Business Green reports.
Information made available to the public says that the overall energy generating capacity of these over 21,000 photovoltaic panels amounts to 5.8MW. Besides, the automotive company plans to up this output to 6.3MW by the end of 2014.
Specialists estimate that, when up and running at full capacity, the massive solar array on top of Jaguar Land Rover's new Engine Manufacturing Center will roll out enough clean power to meet roughly 30% of the facility's overall power demand.
To help put things in perspective, the multinational automotive company details that, according to its calculations, the power output of its rooftop solar panel array would suffice to meet the energy need of about 1,600 homes.
Given the fact that harvesting clean energy sources goes hand in hand with reducing greenhouse gas emissions, it should not come as a surprise that Jaguar Land Rover expects that the solar array will help it make significant progress in terms of improving on its ecological footprint.
Thus, the company says that, throughout the course of an entire year, the rooftop clean energy installation will help reduce the carbon footprint of its Engine Manufacturing Center by about 2,400 tones. In doing so, it will help fight climate change and global warming.
In a statement, the Center's Operations Director, Trevor Leeks, said, “Our world-class facility showcases the latest sustainable technologies and innovations.” Furthermore, “The completion of the UK’s largest rooftop solar panel installation here at the Engine Manufacturing Center is just one example of this.”
Jaguar Land Rover's new Engine Manufacturing Center is said to have cost some £500 (about €604.2 million / $830.6 million) million to build. The facility is equipped with heating and lighting systems intended to help lower energy demand, and its design allows it to make the most of daylight and natural ventilation.
Interestingly enough, the company says that it has plans to install boxes, dead wood stumps and the like, and thus encourage small mammals, invertebrates, birds and other creatures to visit the site. These boxes and wood stumps are to be part and parcel of a so-called ecological corridor that Jaguar Land Rover wishes to establish.