Addis Herald
  • Home
  • History
  • Africa
  • Travel
  • Music
  • Culture
  • Art

Culture

  • Hair salon in Addis AbabaHana Yilma Godine: Substance in Ethiopia
  • Or. 607The Ethiopian Emperor’s Manuscripts
  • 36540E1A-A477-4FDD-A4E7-2DD01514F57DEthiopian Manuscripts and Painting from the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century
  • 184D8D78-8168-43A0-8F33-95AAC1CE81B2The Top Ten Ethiopia’s Endemic Wild Animals
  • 68B656DE-B1F3-47D4-9F6A-198C6FA6FCA3The New Face of Addis

Business

  • China-Ethiopia-forumEthiopia’s Export to China Grows Amid Booming FDI from Chinese Companies to the Country
  • 32AAAC40-C7CF-4A10-8C4A-D63F30DC6D07As Telebirr Increases it’s Subscribers to 18 mln, It’s Mother company Ethio Telecom launches 5G network
  • 57BD9DF7-CDDD-4722-AD63-F5A0C41A11B1Recovery Period: Inside Ethiopian Airlines’ 4-Pillar Growth Strategy
  • DC89FC8D-FC0B-4547-B6E6-7D8A4540717E12 investment opportunities in Ethiopia’s packaging industry
  • 3D2D6F24-5BB6-4943-AD60-DA8E222749C2Ethiopian Airlines leases two Dash 8-400 aircraft from TrueNoord

Africa

  • Forecast Shows Wet Conditions for the Northern parts of Eastern AfricaForecast Shows Wet Conditions for the Coming Three Months in the Greater Part of East Africa: ICPAC
  • 6282560d85f540722f371ffcCan Africa replace Russia as the EU’s main source of gas?
  • Amilcar Cabral 1Claim No Easy Victories: What We Learned from Amilcar Cabral
  • 2B04558D-E562-4F0C-B0F8-36082FF2C299As Gas hold the key to Africa’s energy future , it also may Rescue Europe’s energy crisis
  • C1480A4F-9399-4DEC-8DE9-6CD659342646African entrepreneurs need to be taken seriously
default
April 22, 2021

Africa’s biggest supermarket chain is betting on solar power

By Nell Lewis, CNN

(CNN)Despite South Africa averaging more than 2,500 hours of sunshine a year, solar energy generates less than 1% of its electricity. By contrast, the UK produces 4% of its electricity from solar, with considerably less sunshine. South African supermarket Shoprite sees a missed opportunity. The chain is the continent’s largest food retailer, with 140,000 employees and more than 2,000 stores across 14 countries. It wants renewable energy to fuel a quarter of its operations in the next five years.

Shoprite already boasts a total of more than 480,000 square feet of solar panels on top of its 21 distribution centers and stores in South Africa and Namibia — an area equivalent to around eight soccer fields. These generate enough solar energy to power 1,100 households for a year, but with every store and distribution center requiring refrigeration 24 hours a day, this accounts for less than 1% of the group’s overall energy use.

Shoprite's Basson Distribution Center, on the outskirts of Cape Town, has solar panels on its roof covering an area equivalent to a soccer field. Shoprite’s Basson Distribution Center, on the outskirts of Cape Town, has solar panels on its roof covering an area equivalent to a soccer field. That may not sound like much, but it’s enough to save money, according to Sanjeev Raghubir, Group Sustainability Manager at the Shoprite Group.”The electricity bill for the whole company is in the region of 2.5 billion Rand ($167 million) … 1% of such a large number is still quite significant,” Raghubir tells CNN.

How solar tech could help distribute Covid-19 vaccines in AfricaTo reach its 25% renewable energy target, the company announced in March that it is working with a partner (the name of which it would not disclose for commercial reasons) to build and commission utility-scale wind and solar plants, which will generate electricity that’s then transported via the national grid.It will also accelerate the rollout of rooftop solar panels and explore opportunities to build solar plants in other countries.

Moving off-grid

Shoprite is not the only company with a base in South Africa looking to develop its off-grid capabilities. In 2018, Siemens started building a solar mini-grid at its Johannesburg headquarters to help reduce its dependence on the national grid, and last year, a Ford assembly plant in Pretoria installed solar panels that are set to provide a third of its power.

In some African countries, the national grid supply can be erratic. South Africans have become used to frequent power cuts; when the state-owned power company Eskom struggles to meet the demand for electricity it activates a system of scheduled outages known as “load-shedding” to avoid a countrywide blackout. Last year, the country experienced almost 860 hours of outages. This is thought to have accelerated private investments in renewable energy.

Deploying mini-grids can be a good solution, explains Patrick Touni, head of policy and regional strategy at GOGLA, a global association for the off-grid solar energy industry. Sunshine is an abundant resource across Africa and solar technology has become “sustainable, reliable and affordable compared to the grid,” he says.

More than half of Shoprite's delivery trucks are fitted with solar panels to aid refrigeration.

More than half of Shoprite’s delivery trucks are fitted with solar panels to aid refrigeration. Investing in renewables isn’t just about saving money. “Climate change is probably the single biggest threat that we have as a business and society,” says Raghubir, adding that it will impact the company’s ability to source, process, transport, and sell products, as well as affecting communities where it operates.

Shoprite has also acted to make its fleet of delivery vehicles greener. Since around 85% of the nation’s electricity is generated by coal, introducing electric vehicles isn’t necessarily a solution, says Raghubir.

Instead, the company has fitted solar panels to more than half of its 1,200-strong fleet of refrigerated trucks. These allow drivers to switch off the engine at delivery locations, border posts or when stuck in traffic while keeping the refrigerators running. Raghubir is confident that Shoprite’s efforts towards energy efficiency will benefit both the business and consumers.

“The only way you can be affordable is if you’re efficient,” he says, “and efficiency and environmental responsibility are best friends. The more efficient your operation is, the less energy you use, the less water you use, the less waste you produce.”

ECA plays the leading role in Africa’s fight against climate change UN Security Council Press Statement on Ethiopia

Related Posts

Forecast Shows Wet Conditions for the Northern parts of Eastern Africa

Africa, Headlines

Forecast Shows Wet Conditions for the Coming Three Months in the Greater Part of East Africa: ICPAC

6282560d85f540722f371ffc

Africa, Headlines

Can Africa replace Russia as the EU’s main source of gas?

Amilcar Cabral 1

Africa, World

Claim No Easy Victories: What We Learned from Amilcar Cabral

What It’s Like To Be A Billionaire In Ethiopia

https://youtu.be/UsczEq9RtqI
https://youtu.be/oT1LO-6OC-I

Travel

  • Ethiopia has Over 10,000 Megalithic Monuments dating Back to the 1st CenturyEthiopia has Over 10,000 Megalithic Monuments Dating Back to the 1st Century
  • ethiopia_ethiopian_wolf_35Brilliant Ethiopia: The Unique Wonder
  • F6BD7E94-BC77-4B3E-B905-7B140F12F5FDKenya Had an Elephant ‘Baby Boom’ — and Now You Can Adopt One
  • Addis_herald_omo_3910 Main Tourist Attractions Places in Africa
  • Homage to Entoto Park How the Old “Town in the Forest” is turning into a newly flowering tourist hubHomage to Entoto Park How the Old “Town in the Forest” is turning into a newly flowering tourist hub

Africa

  • Forecast Shows Wet Conditions for the Northern parts of Eastern AfricaForecast Shows Wet Conditions for the Coming Three Months in the Greater Part of East Africa: ICPAC
  • 6282560d85f540722f371ffcCan Africa replace Russia as the EU’s main source of gas?
  • Amilcar Cabral 1Claim No Easy Victories: What We Learned from Amilcar Cabral
  • 2B04558D-E562-4F0C-B0F8-36082FF2C299As Gas hold the key to Africa’s energy future , it also may Rescue Europe’s energy crisis
  • C1480A4F-9399-4DEC-8DE9-6CD659342646African entrepreneurs need to be taken seriously

Culture

  • Hair salon in Addis AbabaHana Yilma Godine: Substance in Ethiopia
  • Or. 607The Ethiopian Emperor’s Manuscripts
  • 36540E1A-A477-4FDD-A4E7-2DD01514F57DEthiopian Manuscripts and Painting from the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century
  • 184D8D78-8168-43A0-8F33-95AAC1CE81B2The Top Ten Ethiopia’s Endemic Wild Animals
  • 68B656DE-B1F3-47D4-9F6A-198C6FA6FCA3The New Face of Addis

Business

  • China-Ethiopia-forumEthiopia’s Export to China Grows Amid Booming FDI from Chinese Companies to the Country
  • 32AAAC40-C7CF-4A10-8C4A-D63F30DC6D07As Telebirr Increases it’s Subscribers to 18 mln, It’s Mother company Ethio Telecom launches 5G network
  • 57BD9DF7-CDDD-4722-AD63-F5A0C41A11B1Recovery Period: Inside Ethiopian Airlines’ 4-Pillar Growth Strategy
  • DC89FC8D-FC0B-4547-B6E6-7D8A4540717E12 investment opportunities in Ethiopia’s packaging industry
  • 3D2D6F24-5BB6-4943-AD60-DA8E222749C2Ethiopian Airlines leases two Dash 8-400 aircraft from TrueNoord

RSS Allfrica.com News feed

  • Africa: WHO DG Recounts Successes in War Against HIV, Malaria, Other Diseases #WHA75
  • Africa: Fix Broken Financing to Ensure a #StrongWHO – Appeal from 80 Organizations
  • Africa: Deputy Minister Mashego-Dlamini Co-Chairs the 10th Session of the South Africa - Iran Deputy Ministerial Working Group, 23 May
  • Africa: What Is Monkeypox? a Microbiologist Explains What's Known About This Smallpox Cousin
  • Africa: One Week Left to Comment On South Africa's New Labour Migration Policy
  • Africa: Tom Saintfiet Names the Gambia Squad for the Totalenergies AFCON Qualifiers
  • Africa: Togo - Ayite's Comeback for Eswatini and Cape Verde
  • Africa: India 2022 - Luvanga Nets Hat Trick As Tanzania Stun Cameroon in Yaounde
  • Africa: Cameroon - African Football Legends Celebrates Milla At 70
  • Africa: Senegal Beach Soccer Championship Starts On June 19
  • Abijitta-Shalla National Park
  • Alatish Ethiopian National Park
  • Awash National Park
  • Babille Elephant Sanctuary
  • Bahir Dar Blue Nile Millennium Park
  • Bale National Park; Ethiopia’s lesser-known Treasure
  • Bale Mountains National Park
  • Borena-Sayint National Park
  • Chebera Churchura National Park
  • Dati Wolel National park
  • Gambella National Park
  • Gambella National Park 2
  • Kafta-Sheraro National Park
  • Mago National Park
  • Maze National Park
  • Nechisar National Park, Ethiopia
  • Omo National Park 
  • The Semien Mountains
  • Yabello National Park
  • Yangudi Rassa National Park
© Addis Herald 2022
  • Contact us
en English
af Afrikaansam Amharicar Arabiczh-CN Chinese (Simplified)en Englishfr Frenchde Germanel Greekhi Hindiit Italianja Japaneseko Koreanla Latinru Russianes Spanishsu Sudanesesw Swahilisv Swedish