David Brown Santasalo India switches to Solar Power

We are delighted to share the next exciting development in our sustainability journey. David Brown Santasalo India recently completed the installation of a 55kW solar power plant on the roof of our facility in Hosur, India. There are an impressive 102 panels in total installed into the facility, each with a capacity of 545 watts!  

Through the installation of solar power into the building, we expect to generate approximately 80,000 kWh per annum. Furthermore, we expect to reduce our power consumption at our manufacturing facility in Hosur by 50% in the first year, which equates to a reduction of approximately 99 tons of carbon emissions! This will in turn help us in reducing our fixed overheads  by approximately 30%.

In late 2023, Venkatesh Subramanyam, Managing Director for DBS India and the team welcomed David Brown Santasalo’s CEO, David Armitt to an inauguration ceremony to officially mark the completion of the installation project. The solar power project is now fully operational and we are already seeing an impact!

Venkatesh said, “This is a great milestone for the business, as we take another step in our journey towards reducing our reliance on finite resources and develop greener and more efficient, sustainable facilities across our global locations. We are already reaping the rewards of reducing our carbon emissions and I am excited to see this continue into the future.”

In 2021 David Brown Santasalo was one of the first gearbox manufacturers to commit to the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi), which provides a defined pathway for corporate organisations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, in line with the latest climate science. Since that time, we have calculated our Scope 1 and 2 emissions in line with SBTi requirements (the GHG Protocol), and will be setting an ambitious target of a 50.4% reduction by 2033 compared to our baseline year of 2021 (targets to be validated by SBTi in the near future). 

David Armitt, CEO said, “It was great to join the team in India for the inauguration of the new solar power system in the facility. Energy audits and efficiency drives at many of our locations, including solar power at our Bulli, Australia facility, have resulted in energy savings and the associated reduction in carbon emissions, which is an exciting start for the business."

We will continue to share more of these initiatives as they continue to roll out and as our journey to a 50.4% reduction in emissions continues.