France’s national railway operator, SNCF, has begun a trial of solar panels on its railway tracks. The six-month long pilot scheme, dubbed the Solveig Project, was launched in mid-January 2025 at Achères, a commune on the south bank of the Seine, in the Yvelines department, about 24km from Paris.
The system relies on a moveable, container-based, solar-plus-storage plant developed by SNCF subsidiary, AREP. The company’s Director of Innovation, Alistair Lenczner, has explained that as well as developing the ISO containers for the photo-voltaic (PV) panels, AREP also innovated the method for installing them (and uninstalling them as needed).
The logistics entail a telescopic arm that puts the panels in place, secures them and prevents damage from weather elements such as wind while optimising sun exposure. Another key benefit is that, as they form a temporary and reversible installation, the modular panels need no prior foundational or building work.
Targeting 1,000 MWp of photovoltaic capacity by 2030
Around 80% of SNCF’s trains run on electricity and the new infrastructure is currently designed as an internal energy source for the firm. But, with up to 113,800 hectares of SNCF land available for PV installation, if the trial proves the panels’ performance and reliability, the Solveig prototype will make an important contribution to the rail operator’s target to install 1,000 MWp of photovoltaic capacity by the year 2030.
Speaking to PV Magazine, Lenczner has already highlighted the panels’ potential for export across Europe and beyond, thanks to a standardised design that can be made to fit in with a range of different technical specifications.
Solar panels in unusual places
The Solveig Project is not the first of its type to use railway infrastructure and land as a place to put solar panels. Autumn 2024 saw Swiss authorities at the Federal Office of Transport (FOT) give the go-ahead for removable solar power solutions along its railways. A 100-metre section of line in Neuchâtel has been earmarked for the trial, due to begin at some point in 2025.
Creative thinking about where to install panels has also been witnessed elsewhere. Norway’s national football stadium received a world-first renewable energy facility in May 2024, in the form of the planet’s largest vertical panel rooftop solar energy system, created by Over Easy. The vertical installation gives yields that are 20-30% higher than normal panels, the firm says, and with two faces, benefits from two peak power moments per day. The panels’ location in such a snowy European capital also means they are perfectly poised to take advantage of a phenomenon known as albedo – the ratio of light reflected by a surface relative to the light falling on it.
Meanwhile, in November 2024, the Chinese went live with a giant offshore solar plant in Shandong Province. The 1-gigawatt facility was claimed to be the world-first and the largest of its kind, occupying an area of approximately 1,223 hectares.
