From empty roofs.. to 10,000 solar panels

The transition from fossil sources of electricity to renewable sources is in full progress. Wageningen University & Research (WUR) wants to contribute to the energy transition and therefore, renewable energy and energy savings are very important to us.

Every year, our goal is to produce more renewable energy than we consume, with the use of our windmills, Aquifer Thermal Energy Storage (ATES) and solar panels. The first solar panels were installed in 2016 on the roof of a new gym on Sports Centre De Bongerd. Today, more than 10,000 solar panels are generating sustainable energy on buildings and grounds. Curious where the solar panels are located? You can find them on roofs of WUR buildings on campus and at our locations in Lelystad, Bleiswijk, Goutum, Renkum and Randwijk. We use the energy generated at the WUR buildings and they provide around 3% of our annual energy usage (the rest of our energy usage is covered by the wind energy).

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Next to renewable energy production, energy efficiency is also important to drive down our energy consumption. WUR has been committed to realise an energy-efficiency improvement of 30% in the period 2005-2020. Not only did we reach this goal, we even went beyond and reached an improvement of energy-efficiency of 34%. We want to keep improving our energy efficiency and have drawn up the WUR Energy Vision for 2030. In the years ahead, WUR will vigorously pursue the energy strategy based on this vision.

Next steps?

  • Our energy generation through solar panels has grown the last couple of years and we are planning on installing more solar panels in the near future.