South Africa’s biggest rooftop solar plants

South Africa’s top five largest rooftop solar installations can each produce well over 1MWh of energy every hour during the sunniest hours of the day.

Due to a combination of rising load-shedding, relaxed regulations on small-scale embedded generation, and tax incentives, South Africa saw an explosion of rooftop solar adoption in the past two years.

According to Eskom’s latest estimates, around 5,953MW of “behind the meter” rooftop solar power had been installed in South African homes and businesses by the end of July 2024.

About 62% of that capacity was added in just the last two years — and a substantial part of that contribution came from businesses reducing their reliance on Eskom.

Among the large companies that have been highly receptive of rooftop solar is Shoprite.

By its financial year ended 3 July 2022, the area covered by the grocery giant’s store and distribution centre rooftop solar panels was equivalent to more than 26 soccer fields. It has continued to grow in recent years.

As of April 2024, Shoprite had rolled out solar photovoltaic (PV) systems to 76 sites. Since 2022, its total self-generating capacity jumped 36.5%.

However, although Shoprite’s solar power installations are substantial in cumulative size, no single site has near the capacity of the largest rooftop solar installations in the country.

Major solar installation provider Solareff, which Stanlib recently acquired from Alviva Holdings, completed the second phase of a record-breaking rooftop solar installation at the Eastgate Shopping Centre in Bedfordview, Germiston, this month.

In its final form, the facility has a whopping 7.216MWp production capacity, about 2,000 times that of the typical entry-level home solar system.

It can also support up to 6MW of demand at once, equivalent to running 2,000 electric geysers or 4,000 electric kettles simultaneously. That is sufficient to meet around 35% of the shopping centre’s energy demand.

The installation consists of 13,675 PV panels and required building extensive supporting structures for the equipment.

Aside from saving on their Eskom bill and being protected against outages, the investment allows property owner Liberty Two Degrees to proudly boast about having the largest rooftop solar installation on the continent.

It is not the only impressive facility installed by Solareff.

Before the Eastgate project, the company held the record for the biggest commercial installation in Africa with Boardwalk Inkwazi’s 6.8MWp installation in Richards Bay, completed in 2022.

That facility required an astounding 400km of DC cabling and is now the second-biggest plant of its kind in the country and on the continent.

Two more of the top five biggest solar rooftop installations were also done by Solareff — the 4.8MWp system at Mall of Africa and the 2.9MWp system at Clearwater Mall.

The latter was the first commercial rooftop solar plant to boast over 1MWp capacity in South Africa.

Metsolar creeps into the top 5 following its recent completion of a 2.2MWp installation for CTP Printers in Isando, Ekurhuleni.

It packs 17 massive SolarEdge inverters, each with 100kW output, and 70km of DC cabling. It is the only installation built for a single company, while the other four were for malls or shopping centres with numerous shops as tenants.

Below are the top five biggest rooftop solar installations in South Africa

1. Eastgate Shopping Centre in Germiston — 7.216MWp

• Solar panel number: 13,675
• Area covered: 28,100m²
• Installer: Solareff
• Completion date: 2024
• Property developer: Liberty Two Degrees

2. Boardwalk Inkwazi in Richards Bay — 6.8MWp

• Solar panel number: 12,580
• Area covered: Unknown
• Installer: Solareff
• Completion date: 2022
• Property developer: Resilient Real Estate Investment Trust

3. Mall of Africa in Midrand — 4.755MWp

• Solar panel number: 15,000
• Area covered: 45,000m2
• Installer: Solareff
• Completion date: 2018
• Property developer: Attacq

4. Clearwater Mall in Roodepoort — 2.904MWp

• Solar panel number: Unknown
• Area covered: 17,000m²
• Installer: Solareff
• Completion date: 2015
• Property developer: Hyprop

5. CTP Printers Isando in Ekurhuleni — 2.153MWp

• Solar panel number: 4,785
• Area covered: Unkown
• Installer: MetSolar
• Completion date: 2024
• Developer: CTP Printers