Sterling Bank Plc will from the second quarter of this year begin powering its corporate headquarters solely through solar energy, an official of the company has said.
Olabanjo Alimi, group head of transport and renewable energy at Sterling Bank told BusinessDay that the building will become energy sufficient to generate its own energy and be able to power itself after going off-grid.
According to him, this is just a demonstration of the bank’s intent as far as renewable energy is concerned.
The building which is powered by Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) energy technology as its primary source of energy, is set to fully go off-grid in the second quarter of the year.
The Bank has developed a ‘HEART’ strategy which focuses on investments primarily in five sectors of the economy: health, education, agriculture, renewable energy, and transportation.
Read also: Solar mini-grids seen helping investors optimise agricultural value chain
Sterling Bank became the first African corporate organisation to power its headquarters with BIPV energy technology as its primary source of energy in 2021.
Following approval from the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission and the relevant agency of the Lagos State Government, and the signing of an agreement between Sterling Bank and PriVida Power Limited, a Nigerian-based international energy company, the BIPV project went underway in Lagos, Nigeria.
In terms of the other renewable projects in the bank’s pipeline, Alimi said that there is a place where people are trained to meet the demands of solar home systems.
“We have a program for solartricians—an electrician program—just to look at the ecosystem and see people who require a bit of capacity building and helping to connect with people who are technically capable to train them to get better at what they do.
“In a nutshell, that’s how we look at the value chain as far as renewable energy is concerned,” the group head said.
