Autonomous Energy has designed and installed an impressive solar power system at Westfield Coomera Shopping Centre on the Gold Coast, QLD. The complex system incorporates roof-top solar - across a number of different buildings - as well as a solar car park shading structure. The system was designed by our experienced solar PV engineers and includes DC optimisers to ensure the high performance of the system in all weather.
This impressive solar PV system features installations at a number of different locations across the site. Half of the system is positioned on 6 roofs - across 3 separated buildings - whilst the other half of the system is situated on a gull-wing car park located above the shops. At the time of completion, the Westfield Coomera solar project includes the LARGEST solar car park in Australia, and provides parking for approximately 450 cars.
The system overall produces an impressive 2.3MW of power from almost 6,000 solar panels. The system was designed by the Autonomous Energy team. The project was installed over an 8 month period and was fully managed by our experienced project delivery team, to the highest levels of Safety, Quality and Performance.
Scentre Group have identified their electricity usage as the most important contributor to their total greenhouse gas emissions. They continue to take significant steps towards their goal of over 5MW of onsite, distributed solar generation capacity by 2020. Coomera Shopping Centre is one of 4 Westfield locations contributing towards this solar target.
Autonomous Energy solution
- The solar system is carefully integrated into the overall site and has been highly coordinated throughout 8 months of installation.
- Every panel is connected to an optimiser. The system features almost 6,000 solar panels and the same number of DC optimisers.
- Connection to 4 different MSBs across the site.
- Custom made ramping system consisting of Meteo control devices monitor consumption at the feeding point and send ramping signals to each inverter across the site via the client's network.
- Independent metering and data logging of output has been designed and integrated by the Autonomous Energy team for ongoing performance monitoring and reporting.
- The system features a Solar Edge monitoring portal and Meteo control online platform with access to all the site information, plus two wind / irradiance / temperature sensors across the site.
- The data monitoring of the system fully integrates with the shopping centre’s BMS, allowing Scentre Group full visibility of the performance and energy contribution of the solar power system.
What Scentre Group says
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We initially chose to work with Autonomous Energy based on a combination of track record and price. The Autonomous Energy team has been self-sufficient and ‘low-maintenance’ - they have all been professional and easy to deal with, especially at times where change requests from our side have required additional legwork, but haven’t always converted into confirmed variations.
- Simon Witt, Project Engineer, Scentre Group