Southeast Asia’s largest single solar rooftop at a shipyard is to be installed on top of a steel structure fabrication workshop at Sembcorp Marine’s Tuas Boulevard yard in the west of Singapore.

Sembmarine has inked an agreement with utility SP Group over the 4.5MW project.

They will develop a digital energy system which will generate and manage solar power so as to reduce 30% of grid-supplied electricity consumed by the yard’s steel fabrication facility during times of peak load.

The solar rooftop will deliver 5.38GWh of energy annually. The energy-saving system will also include energy storage capabilities, energy sensors and a real-time digital platform to monitor, analyse and optimise energy use at the yard.

Work on installing the project will start in early 2018, and is scheduled for completion in the fourth quarter of the year.

Singapore wants to have 350MW of solar in place by 2020.