COUNCILLORS have agreed to spend £20,000 to look at whether more solar panels can be installed on top of a city centre car park.

Worcester City Council is looking to add to the number of solar panels on top of St Martin’s Gate car park in Worcester at a cost of around £400,000.

The council’s environment committee agreed to put forward up to £20,000 for a study to look at whether the work can go ahead at a meeting on Tuesday (July 19).

At the meeting, Kevin Moore, the council’s head of property and asset management, said: “There is certainly room for five times the size of the existing array of [solar panels] on the roof level and we have done some rough calculations and it will potentially cost an estimated £400,000 … which could generate around £40,000 a year in terms of what we currently pay in electricity prices.

“Obviously that is due to go up very significantly this year and beyond so the return is very likely to increase.”

Around 40 spaces would be lost from the 760-space car park to make way for the new panels if the work goes ahead.

The council believes it would be able to cope with the loss of car parking spaces in the city centre saying it is only usually full at weekends and during Christmas and only a handful of cars usually park on the top level during the week.

The city centre car park became the first council-owned building to have solar panels when they were installed in 2019.

The city council said it has saved £15,000 on its energy bills since the solar panels were switched on in early 2019 and reduced its carbon footprint by more than two tonnes every year.

The panels currently generate around 42,000kwh of electricity every year on average, which helps power hundreds of lights, 12 electric vehicle charging points and a handful of lifts.

However, it currently takes around 260,000kwh to completely power the car park every year.

Installing more solar panels on the roof level and open sections on the fourth level would help generate at least 250,000kwh every year.

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