Salford City Council

GMCA Solar Car Ports

GMCA Solar Car Ports

Salford City Council has implemented a solar car port project as part of Greater Manchester's broader decarbonisation strategy to achieve net zero by 2038. The initiative, delivered by Vital Energi, involves the installation of solar car ports at the council's Swinton and Turnpike depots and will be responsible for 270 tonnes of carbon reduction per year.

  • solar
    1575 Solar Panels
  • electricity symbol or lightning bolt
    575,000kWh Electricity per annum
  • reducing-carbon
    270 tonnes Carbon Reduction

Project Overview

Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) has set a target of installing 45MW of Solar PV through local schemes. This initiative makes up part of its larger decarbonisation strategy to achieve net zero by 2038.

One of the projects which will contribute to this target is a solar car port scheme being delivered by Vital Energi on behalf of Salford City Council.

The council installed solar car ports at their Swinton and Turnpike depots. These will generate low-carbon electricity, which will be used by council and NHS buildings or exported to the grid.

The project was part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund, with Salford City Council.

Vital Solution

One of the key requirements from the council was that they did not want to lose any car parking spaces to the solar car ports. Our designers engaged with the market, looking at a variety of designs and found one which could achieve this, whilst providing stability and longevity.


The Solar Car Port system is made up of pre-engineered frames for ease of assembly, made of cold-rolled steel and anchored to concrete strip footings. The Solar PV panels attach to the trapezoidal sheet roof of the car ports with a short rail mounting system.


Overall, between the two sites, we have installed 1,575 solar panels which are capable of generating over 575,000kWh of low-carbon electricity per year. This will be used by council and NHS offices, with the remaining electricity being exported to the grid.

Mall 1

The carport solution was designed to ensure no spaces were lost at either depot.

Solution detail

By choosing solar carports the council have been able to make use of their car park without losing any spaces. It’s an innovative solution and will allow the council to generate significant solar electricity which is another strong step on their road to net zero.

Gemma Dyson, Pre-construction Director - Vital Energi

Choosing the right car port system

We chose a car port system which would provide value for money, stability and have low, long-term operation and maintenance costs. Our supplier offered flexible design options which enabled us to specify that each car port would fit two cars and this enabled us to meet the client’s core wish that they didn’t lose any parking spaces.


The system is ready for assembly, with no hot works on site and, due to the limited number of components, can be assembled quickly. Another significant bonus was that the car port frames are made from rolled steel. This combines lower costs with a long life span, low operation and maintenance costs and, as the system is lighter than traditional solutions, makes the delivery, handling and construction phases less labour intensive.

Key Benefits

GMCS Solar Car Ports

Download Case Study GMCA Solar Car Ports 2.38 Mb