Project Sunshine

Harnessing 2,000 hours of sunshine a year

Singapore is the ideal location for Rolls-Royce largest solar panel installation, with the region enjoying more than 2,000 sunshine hours a year. More than 11,700 photovoltaic panels have been installed on the roof and car park of our Seletar aerospace campus.

Designed with sustainability in mind

At our Seletar campus, we assemble and test Trent aero engines including the Trent 7000 and the Trent 1000 TEN. Singapore is also the only place outside the UK to manufacture our titanium wide-chord fan blade.

When the campus was opened in 2012 it was awarded a Platinum rating by the Singapore Building Construction Authority (BCA) Green Mark Scheme. The scheme recognises the highest levels of environmental design in construction and the use of green building technologies.

The facility was designed with sustainability criteria in mind. Primarily energy efficiency, water efficiency, environmental protection, indoor environmental quality and high environmental building performance.

The building cooling system has been optimised to provide best practice system efficiency, with a heat recovery system to control building humidity and condensate water recycling. The buildings are also orientated to minimise solar heat gain. These contribute to an estimated 20-25% lower cooling costs.

An ideal location

Seletar is ideally situated to generate renewable energy from active solar panels located on the roof of the building and from canopies in the carpark.

An ideal location

Seletar is ideally situated to generate renewable energy from active solar panels located on the roof of the building and from canopies in the carpark.

Singapore benefits from over 2,000 sunshine hours a year and is an ideal location for solar power generation.

We have completed installation of over 11,700 solar photovoltaic panels on the roof and car park of our Seletar facility. This is the largest solar photovoltaic installation in Singapore owned and operated by the developer.

All the electricity generated is used directly by our manufacturing facility with the system producing around 8% of the site’s yearly electricity demand.

Saving over 39,000 tonnes CO2

Solar is an important and inexhaustible source of energy that will enable us to reduce the environmental impact of our operations and gain greater pricing certainty for the future.

Over its lifetime, the installation at Seletar will save over 39,000 tonnes of CO2 equivalent annually, equivalent to taking almost 5,000 cars off the road. The panels supply 8% of the site’s energy needs.

The installation will also enable us to reduce the risk and uncertainty associated with future energy pricing. This is particularly important as we increase production at facility to deliver against our order book.

“We are very proud of this project as it demonstrates our desire to become more sustainable, reduce our company’s impact on the environment and to help us gain greater pricing certainty for the future.”
Tim Sullivan, Rolls-Royce Group Property

The success of this project means we are exploring opportunities to replicate this installation at other facilities around the world, including other locations in Asia and the United States. In 2016, we completed a further solar photovoltaic installation on the roof of our manufacturing facility in Bristol, UK.

Accelerating progress towards our global target

This solar PV installation was the first of multiple renewable and low carbon energy projects planned globally, including further solar installations, energy storage, and combined heat, power and cooling plants.

These will accelerate progress towards our target of achieving zero GHG emissions from our operations and facilities by 2030.

Find out more on our targets dashboard