WesBank and sister company First National Bank(FNB) have announced a R60m project to replace the shade-net carports at its shared offices in Fairland, Johannesburg, with solar-panel carports.
The project will hopefully nudge the 150 000-m2 campus towards a five-star rating from the Green Building Council of South Africa.
More than 5 000 WesBank and FNB employees are based at the Fairland campus, which has 978 outdoor parking bays.
Over the next 11 months, ageing car ports will be replaced by 7 019 photovoltaic panels
that will be capable of providing 1 806 kWh of energy (at peak) to the building, with a total expected supply of 3 000 000 kWh a year. This would be enough to power the average South African household for nearly 800 years.
Existing measures have saved the campus around 40% in energy consumption, equal to R9m a year. The Fairland campus currently already has a 4-star rating from the GBCSA and includes a number of energy and water saving features.
The carport solar-panel project will be rolled out in two phases, with the first to be completed by March next year.
The second phase is scheduled for completion by September next year, when the campus will switch on its solar grid – and save the group around R3,9m in electricity costs during the first year of operation.
The project manager is LTM Energy, based in Midrand.
