Solar + Metro: Green Power for Shanghai Metro

The Longyang Road Metro Rail Yard in Pudong serves Lines 2 and 7 of the Shanghai Metro, with trains coming in and out every day. What many people don't know is that the metro hangar here is a hidden power plant. The hangar rooftop is covered with solar panels providing clean and green electricity for metro trains.

Powered by Huawei's smart PV solution, the solar plant has an installed capacity of 3.66 MW, and generates an average of about 3.4 million kWh of electricity each year. This can help save the equivalent of about 1,200 tons of coal, or a reduction in CO₂ emissions by 3,390 tons¹. The total area of the solar plant on the hangar rooftop is 50,000 square meters, which is equivalent to the size of five or six football fields. Nearly 13,000 280-watt modules have been installed. The solar panels are connected to metro yard substation, which feeds the connecting metro lines. The electricity generated by the solar plant in one year can support about 200,000 km of travel for a Line 2 train with 8 cars, which is equivalent to more than 1,560 round trips of Line 2.

The PV solar power plant at Shanghai Metro Longyang Road rail yard(The M represents the metro, and the green grass represents being environmentally friendly)

As of the end of 2020, ten Shanghai Metro rail yards have grid-connected PV systems. Together, they represent a total installed capacity of about 24 MW and will generate on average about 23 million kWh each year. Moving forward, more Shanghai Metro systems will shift to solar power. 

Using PV in metro systems is a perfect example of how green power can contribute to green transportation and how it can help Shanghai start to cut its carbon emissions sooner.