A film and TV studio in Bristol will be powered by a 1MW solar installation, the biggest community-owned solar rooftop array in the west of England and one of the biggest of its kind in the UK.
The Bottle Yard Studios’ new facility TBY2, opening this autumn, will be powered by the solar installation being funded by the latest share offer of the Bristol Energy Cooperative (BEC), a community-owned energy cooperative.
Bristol City Council, which owns and runs The Bottle Yard Studios, initially planned to install a 283kWp solar array on the rooftop of the Studios’ expansion facility TBY2, but thanks to funding from BEC, the final array will be more than three times larger than originally planned.
It will be installed by Solar South West.
Laura Aviles, Senior Film Manager (Bristol City Council), who oversees The Bottle Yard Studios, said: “Our new TBY2 facility has been designed and built with sustainability in mind at every stage, with premium insulation throughout and a sophisticated building management system to ensure optimal energy conservation.
“We’re hugely proud that the exterior of the building is being put to such valuable use, hosting a community-owned PV array of this size which will generate a huge amount of clean energy to power the site, with surplus energy benefitting the city of Bristol.”
Will Houghton, Bristol Energy Cooperative Project Developer, added: “Solar arrays are often designed to cover just a small part of a roof, to reduce costs.
“But we’re in a climate crisis, and in order to meet Bristol’s climate goals we‘re aiming much higher than that. The Bottle Yard’s TBY2 facility is a massive site, with loads of opportunity for energy generation and CO2 reduction.
“So, for this project, we were determined to make full use of the available roof space. To put it into context, the amount of energy this array is capable of generating could power more than 250 average Bristol households per year.”