FNB Fairlands Campus in Joburg creates enough green energy to power 1,300 homes

In the last decade, the FNB Fairlands Campus has successfully been upgrading the building to lower its carbon footprint by utilising green energy sources.

FNB and WesBank have officially turned on their new solar energy project. The project saw their parking lot get transformed into a solar power farm.

The project has helped the Bank reduce its carbon footprint by more than 2,700 tonnes per year. It has also lowered its dependency on the local power grid and is now passing the benefit on to the community.

The bank building employs more than 5000 people, most of whom coveted the shaded but aged undercover parking. The bank decided to use solar panels and build all new carports. They removed the 978 dilapidated shade-cloth parking bays and replaced them with 1010 bays using 7,647 reflective photovoltaic cells.

“This approach would provide more employees with covered parking and also…lower carbon emissions and strain on the electrical grid,” WesBank said.

WesBank confirmed that at peak efficiency, the system is capable of generating 1.99 megaWatts which is enough to provide power to nearly 1,300 households.

“This year marks a decade since FNB and WesBank occupied the Fairland building. During this time we have been hard at work to come up with energy efficient solutions to power this site,” said Marius Marais, CEO of FNB Home Loans.

“The switch over to solar power has far-reaching implications; we have now eased the load off the mainstream grid and this power can be deployed elsewhere. As FNB, we have taken an innovative approach to alternative energy projects at our buildings, including Portside in Cape Town, which has a 5-Star Green Star SA rating,” he said.

“Flipping the switch on a new era for our landmark building is very exciting. We have passionate people working to reduce our carbon footprint wherever possible, using innovative solutions along the way,” said Chris de Kock, CEO, WesBank.

Corporates switching to green energy and taking the environment into account are big winners in our book! You can see the parking lot below.