Spanish car maker SEAT SA will put up 21 MW of solar panels at its three factories in Catalonia in an effort to boost its self-consumption capacity.
The new panels will be installed as part of the SEAT al Sol 2 project, enabling the company to generate about 29 GWh of clean electricity annually from its own self-consumption systems.
SEAT said that the solar panels will cover an area of 233,000 square metres (2.51 sq ft) across the Martorell, El Prat and Barcelona facilities, including the employee car park at Martorell.
Spanish independent energy trading company Conecta2 Energia will participate in the development of the SEAT al Sol 2 project. SEAT expects the new self-consumption systems to be commissioned in 2024, it said.
The new project will complement its predecessor SEAT at Sol, which has been active since 2013 and will continue to operate. The car maker then installed 11 MW of solar panels on the roofs of the factory workshops and storage space at the Martorell site, with the power to self-generate 17 GWh each year.
SEAT also procures certified green electricity from external sources for all of its facilities, and has made significant investments to start producing fully electric Cupra and Volkswagen cars at Martorell from 2025.
“SEAT al Sol 2 strengthens the objective to decarbonise our facilities and highlights the importance of renewables as a competitive element in our industry. The expansion of the solar project is part of SEAT S.A.’s transformation process, the most ambitious in our history, towards the new era of electric mobility,” said Markus Haupt, SEAT SA Executive Vice-President for Production and Logistics.
