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Toyota’s Texas HQ goes 25% solar and 100% renewable

Toyota’s new headquarters in Texas will source 25% of its power from an onsite PV system, while a deal brokered by an energy management firm means the facility’s remaining energy demand will be met entirely by renewable energy.

The 7.75MW system will be built at the carmaker’s campus under construction in the Lone Star State city of Plano, where it has moved its base of operations from a site in California. Toyota said it is actively seeking to attain USGBC Platinum LEED Certification status in energy efficiency for the HQ. As a wider aim, the manufacturer has pledged to remove all carbon emissions from its operations by 2050.

Published 8 years ago | About a 2 minute read

Planned for construction in three stages, the first 4.9MW of PV will be built by the end of August of next year, split across two equally-sized carports, with the third, 2.83MW plant to be finished by December 2017.

MP2, a Texas-based “full service power company”, also said today that it has signed a five-year retail contract to provide the Plano Toyota headquarters with 100% renewable energy.

The company offers its own plan “Net Energy Billing”, which offers the customer full retail credit for their solar generation when self-consuming all of the power generated. It also sells excess PV generation at real-time prices into the grid and passes the money raised onto the customer. MP2 also provides the balance of electricity at agreed rates when power generated from the PV is insufficient to meet expected demand.

While solar in the US is generally sold in long-term arrangements such as 20-year power purchase agreements (PPAs), MP2 said the shorter, five-year deal with Toyota would allow the car company more flexibility in planning its energy usage and costs.

According to MP2, there will be further flexibility built in to the arrangement, allowing it to add other onsite generation or enter demand response programmes, should they become available.

Toyota appointed energy management solutions company Power Priority Management, which found and arranged the deal with MP2.