MANILA, Philippines – SM Supermalls on Thursday, July 24, unveiled the country’s largest rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) system in a commercial building at SM City Fairview in Quezon City.
The 4.3-hectare system houses 6,882 solar modules and can produce around 5,960 Megawatt-hour (MWh) annually. It also features a 3.785-Megawatt peak power capacity.
With the new solar PV system, SM City Fairview will now source 11% of its annual energy consumption from the sun.
SM Supermalls said in a statement that this offsets the release of 4,133 tons of carbon dioxide every year of operations.
According to Charles Singson, SM’s assistant vice president for mall operations, creating the solar PV system took around a year. This included the installation of the panels, which took around three months to complete.
Singson said that SM aims to install around 100 megawatts of solar PV capacity in its malls by the end of the year.
This includes expanding the rooftop solar PV system in SM North EDSA, which is the first Philippine mall to install a rooftop solar PV system. According to Singson, the panels have already been installed.
“Once the weather improves, we can finish the fine-tuning in around three to four days,” he said.
SM Supermalls’ parent firm SM Prime aims to achieve net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2040.
Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte said the Sy-owned malls’ commitment to sustainability supports the local government’s goal of reducing its GHG emissions by 30% by 2030.
She also highlighted the importance of the private sector in shifting to renewable energy sources since they consume a lot of power.
“Mabigat talaga na goal yan kapag hindi mo ka-partner yung private sector, kasi yung private sector talaga ang maraming ginagamit na energy, ‘yung mga malalawak na buildings, mga commercial buildings, mga factories, mga malls. If they do not embrace sustainable practices, hindi talaga natin maabot ‘yung reduction of 30%,” she explained.
(Reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 30% is a heavy goal if you don’t partner with the private sector, because the private sector uses a lot of energy — those giant buildings, commercial buildings, factories, malls. If they do not embrace sustainable practices, we will never reach that 30% goal.)
The Department of Energy aims to generate 35% of the country’s power supply from renewables by 2030 and further expand this to 50% by 2040. – Rappler.com