Goodyear Malaysia Officially Launches Solar Power Initiative to Reduce Carbon Footprint

The Minister of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change, Puan Yeo Bee Yin recently officiated the launch of Goodyear Malaysia’s sustainability initiative - the installation of 6,680 solar panels to power up and reduce carbon footprint of its corporate office and production plant in Shah Alam.

The solar panel system is capable of producing 2.5-megawatts of power daily, and it is connected to six Low Voltage (LV) substations located within the plant. These panels will be responsible for powering the manufacturing plant, so will as the office and warehouse buildings.

Each panel is made of 375W Bifacial Monocrystalline Perc Double Glass Solar Modules, capable of reducing electricity costs. The panels are estimated to reduce 1,980,433.37 kilograms of carbon emissions per year across 25 years.

With this technology in place, Goodyear is set to reduce its spending on electricity while also significantly reduce the amount of greenhouse gas emissions.

Including this project, Goodyear has invested nearly US$5.7 million into the plant so far as part of its energy and environmental sustainability efforts in Malaysia since 2015. The company said that almost 17% carbon emissions have been eliminated through the effort.

“The solar panels allow us to significantly reduce the amount of electricity that we use. Currently, we are still purchasing electricity from Tenaga Nasional, but once this system is fully optimised, we expect that we will have excess electricity which will be channelled back to the grid,” said Ramon Le, Director of Manufacturing Operations for Goodyear Asia Pacific.