• Swindon & Wiltshire Eco
• Thursday May 22 2025

Innovative solar carports installed by apetito

Frozen food firm apetito has completed a major installation project to increase the number of solar panels across its main manufacturing site in Trowbridge.

The firm has installed 43 innovative solar car ports over its car parks, as well as placing new solar panels across all viable roofs on the site.

The firm said the canopies have been specially designed to maximise the solar generation across the space, whilst also enhancing the parking facilities for all its staff members.

The £1.3 million investment will provide 15 per cent of all the electricity used at its manufacturing plant – and save 245 tonnes of CO2e per year for the business.

The company aims to be Net Zero by 2040.

Lee Sheppard, group director of sustainability, said: “We know that, as part of the Plan for Change, the Government is calling for businesses to better utilise the space of their existing car parks by investing in solar car ports that will produce clean, renewable energy to power their operations.

“We are proud to already be making strides with this initiative to significantly increase our self-generation of electricity, particularly across our manufacturing site, supporting our ambitious emissions reduction targets and ensuring that we decarbonise the business in the right way.”

Earlier this month the government called on businesses – including supermarkets and retail parks – to invest in solar canopies as a way of generating clean electricity.

Launching the government’s Plan for Change, energy secretary Ed Miliband said: “Right now, the sun is shining on hundreds of thousands of car parking spaces across the country which could be used to power our homes and businesses.

“We want to work with businesses and car park operators to turn our car parks into solar carports to save families and businesses money with clean, homegrown British energy.”

Solar carports are already mandatory in some European countries, including France and Slovenia, providing their countries with cheap solar power.

apetito specialises in meals for the health and social care sector.