More than 8,000 solar panels have been installed on the roof of Wolseley UK's National Distribution Centre in Leamington Spa.
The installation, carried out over a six-month period, is set to produce 2MW of electricity per year and could generate £6.5 million over 20 years under the government's Feed In Tariff for commercial buildings.
At full capacity output the system will completely power Wolseley UK's National Distribution Centre, as well as creating a 10% energy surplus.
The payback period of the installation is 6.8 years, which means the centre will receive free energy after seven years. Wolseley UK will also achieve carbon savings of around 1,280 tonnes per year, helping to improve the site's environmental performance.
Steve Ashmore, managing director of Wolseley UK, said: "As a business, we are committed to sustainable building. We opened our Sustainable Building Center in 2008 and we are continuing to lead the way by investing in the technology that we advocate.
"We are already seeing some fantastic environmental and cost savings from our PV installation and I hope that our success will inspire our customers into adopting green energy solutions, due to the significant results they can achieve."
As well as showcasing the renewable products that Wolseley UK supplies to customers, which are on sale via Plumb and Parts Center, the installation has a couple of features to maximise energy efficiency and site safety. Exhaust air from the inverters is channelled into the building's heating systems, potentially generating around 80kW of additional heat. A safety feature has also been built in which means panels will disconnect if the fire alarm is activated, due to the automated DC breakers situated within the string fuse boxes, which are connected to the building's fire control system.
