Bearings and seals maker SKF India has set up a 1-MW roof-top solar plant at its Pune facility, taking the capacity of such solar generated power across its campuses in Pune and Bengaluru to 2.1 MW.

The initiative is part of a solar mission announced by the company that envisages 3.3 MW of roof-top solar capacity and reduction of carbon emissions of up to 4,000 tonnes by 2017.

“Business cannot grow at the cost of environment and so we launched the project SustEn three years ago to make the operations sustainable and energy efficient,” Shishir Joshipura, Managing Director and Country Head, SKF India, said. The next addition of solar capacity could come at Ahmedabad or Mysore, he added.

The roof-top power project has been commissioned by ReNew Power that has invested in setting up 4,100 panels, and entered into a contract with SKF to purchase the power generated for a 25-year period.

The installation is expected to generate 1.5 GwH of power and cut carbon dioxide emission from Pune by 1,200 tonnes per annum.

“Roof-top solar power is at a tipping point and is going to become mainstream as the cost will improve and the landed cost of grid power will become more expensive,” Ajay Goel, President (solar), ReNew Power, said.

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