Corning’s Pharmaceutical Glass Plant Shines with Solar Energy

After its grand opening at the end of 2021, Corning’s pharmaceutical glass tubing facility in Bengbu, China embarked on a new journey – to help power its operations with solar energy.

In 2021, Corning set a goal to reduce Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 30% before 2028. However, our plants have been installing solar panels or entering into power purchase agreements with solar developers to purchase clean energy since 2014. These initiatives are supported by Corning’s Global Energy Management and Corporate Environmental Control teams. Today, with our growing number of solar projects, Corning ranks second among manufacturers in the United States for solar energy use.

In fact, Corning has hosted one of the world’s largest rooftop solar arrays since 2015, when it acquired the former Gerresheimer Glass facility in Vineland, New Jersey, now a Corning Pharmaceutical Technologies (CPT) plant. Today, the Bengbu plant joins Vineland on the list of solar-powered CPT facilities. Corning Life Sciences also runs three facilities with solar arrays.

And we can always find new opportunities.

“In China, we have abundant solar energy resources with a total theoretical reserve of 147× 108GWh energy per year,” explained Jidong Zhong, Plant Manager at the Bengbu facility. “Therefore, we could not pass up the opportunity to harness that energy to power our site.” 

In early 2023, Jidong and his team partnered with the Anhui branch of the National Energy Group to build and operate what would become the plant’s rooftop solar array. The project was completed on July 14 after meeting local requirements.

The array has 3,210 set panels that span roughly 15,800 sq. meters, covering the site's main factory building and newly constructed solar vehicle shed. The panels provide electricity for the facility and its production equipment through the national power grid, with an estimated annual output of 1.73 million kWh.  When operating at full capacity, the array can reduce 1,585 tons of C0₂ emissions annually, which is the equivalent of over 7 million miles (about 1.1M km) driven in a gasoline-powered car.

“The solar array has made a great positive impact on the sustainable development of our facility,” said Jidong. “It not only creates economic benefits, but it also plays a vital role in the development of other local solar projects. We play a significant role in the improving the solar power industry in Bengbu, and in demonstrating Corning’s investment in our planet.” 

The impact doesn’t stop at the local level. Corning’s interest and investment in the future of our planet is something we share with customers around the world.

“Projects like this help our customers lower their environmental footprints, because we represent their upstream scope 3 emissions,” said Sarah Dowdall, Sustainability Program Manager for Corning Life Sciences. “We are driven to keep finding sustainable solutions not only to meet our goals, but to help customers reach theirs.”