Could car park operators source solar power on site to offer charging services to their customers?
Car parks in France larger than 1500M2 (around 20 spaces) will in future have to install solar PV canopies, under a law passed in March 2023 (Decree No. 2024-1023); now the French government has set out the regulations for the measure in detail.
Cecile Brillon Frattaroli and Olivier Fazio, lawyers from Bird & Bird, set out the requirements in two blog posts. They say the law applies to existing and planned car parks and that owners have just 42 months to comply. Car parks have to have 50% coverage by 1 July 2026 if they are above 10,000 m2 (or smaller, if they are a public service concession) and by 1 July 2028 50% coverage applies to all outdoor car parks with an area greater than 1,500 m2.
The surface area includes roads, paths and access facilities, as well as vehicle parking spaces, but not green spaces or rest areas. There are exemptions: if renewable energy is already installed (although which types of renewables qualify is still to be determined); if there are architectural, heritage, or environmental constraints; and if the operator can demonstrate that the cost jeopardises the operator’s economic viability. There are financial penalties for non-compliance.
Car parks have become of interest for PV installation in the UK as well, partly because using greenfield sites for PV is more contentious, but also surely because the logic of charging where electric vehicles can charge seems inarguable. Eastbourne hospital is just one place that is planning to install solar canopies and more will probably follow.
Meanwhile modelling suggests that long-stay car parks could help support the electricity system even without solar generation thanks to the batteries in parked cars. The ‘Park and Flex’ innovation project successfully modelled using car batteries for grid balancing. UK Power Networks, said: “Through Park and Flex, we foresee a world where dormant vehicles can be used as the building blocks for one of the UK’s biggest flex batteries”. The DNO said 4.3GW of flexible electricity demand in such car parks could support energy management in its network areas – London, the East and South East of England.
Renewable energy company RenEnergy includes solar carports and electric vehicle charging stations among its activities and it concluded after recent research that there are over half a million car parking spaces in England and Scotland suitable for solar carports at organisations like hotels, golf clubs, hospitals, airports, amusement parks and sports centres. It says those spaces could represent up to 1.3GW of PV.
It said that “only scratches the surface” as it expects to find many more spaces at other organisations and at commercial car parks such as train stations, service stations, supermarkets and retail parks.
The company says many ports can be installed under ‘permitted development’ rules and it offers a long-term power purchase agreement (PPA) option under which it will install the carport free of upfront charge.
Damian Baker, Managing Director of RenEnergy, said “We are not taking advantage of the solar energy opportunity that is right in front of us in the UK. If businesses are able to make use of an energy supply in their car park at no extra cost to them, we could see the equivalent energy for hundreds of thousands of homes not needing to come from the grid.”