Bosch secures 100 GWh/year solar power in Germany from three utilities

London — German technology and service company Bosch has secured 100 GWh a year supply of solar power through power purchase agreements with three utilities in Germany from 107 MW of subsidy-free solar plants, the companies said August 5.

Statkraft signed a 12-year PPA to supply a total 570 GWh to Bosch sites in Germany, the Norwegian utility said.

The electricity comes from nine solar parks in Bavaria with 47 MW of capacity, for which Statkraft already last year concluded agreements with developer and asset owner Enerparc to allow the solar farms to be realized without subsidies, it said.

"The contract with Bosch shows that it is possible to supply industry with green electricity from Germany on a large scale," Statkraft Germany's managing director Carsten Poppinga said.

RWE's 16-year PPA with Bosch is to supply electricity from several new solar farms in southern Germany with 50 MW of capacity not relying on subsidies developed by RWE and other providers, it said. All projects were set to start by 2021 the latest.

Vattenfall will also supply Bosch for 12 years with solar power from its 10 MW solar park at the A19 motorway junction Wittstock north of Berlin currently under construction with no subsidies and set to start early 2021, it said.

All 400 Bosch locations worldwide will be climate-neutral by the end of 2020, it said.

"We are making faster progress than expected in improving the quality of our [climate] actions," Bosch CEO Volkmar Denner said.

The company emitted around 1.94 million mt of CO2 worldwide in 2019 (Scope 1+2), it said.

Bosch intends to increase the share of renewable energy in its consumption significantly and aims to sign long-term PPAs outside Germany.

In Mexico, the company already covers up to 80% of its energy demand with such new clean power through a 105 GWh/year 15-year PPA with Italian utility Enel.

In addition to the PPAs, Bosch also generates 60 GWh/year from solar panels installed at 50 if its sites worldwide with 22 GWh added 2019.

Bosch plans to expand this to 400 GWh by 2030. The company is also involved in various hydrogen and fuel cell research projects in Germany, it said.