Nantes builds solar canopies at Beaujoire car park

Nantes builds six solar canopies over the Beaujoire stadium car park

Six solar canopies are rising on the Beaujoire stadium's S3 car park in Nantes, three by the SAS Nantes Métropole Énergies and three by citizen-backed CoWatt, to produce 1.1 GWh a year after grid connection in January.

30 October 2026 by Robert Eduard Antal, facts checked automatically against the source · updated 2 November 2026

Key facts

Six new solar canopies are being built on the Beaujoire S3 car park: three by the SAS Nantes Métropole Énergies and three by CoWatt.

The Beaujoire canopies will produce 1.1 GWh a year, equivalent to the annual electricity use of about 950 people, excluding heating and hot water.

Nine photovoltaic projects led by the SAS Nantes Métropole Énergies, all on public car parks, are expected by 2027.

Construction of six solar canopies on the S3 car park of the Beaujoire stadium in Nantes has passed the foundation stage, and steel frames are going up. It is the first site in a programme of nine photovoltaic projects on public car parks that the SAS Nantes Métropole Énergies expects by 2027. It also comes with a search for local buyers of the electricity.

What is being built

Three canopies are carried by the SAS and three by CoWatt, which represents three citizen collectives. They will total 4,500 m² of panels and produce 1.1 GWh a year. That is equivalent to the annual electricity use of about 950 people, excluding heating and hot water.

Works began in September. Micro-piles are driven 7 m deep to limit the volume of concrete. Raising the steel frames will take a month. In November the mounting system for the panels will be fixed to each frame. The site will end in January with the connection to the Enedis grid, and the car park is due to reopen in mid-January.

Selling the power nearby

The project owners are looking for hotels, shops and industrial firms to buy the electricity. They have been talking with FC Nantes for several months. Customers get a tariff guaranteed over a long period. To join this collective self-consumption loop, customers and production sites must lie within a circle 2 km in diameter. A first information meeting with the companies concerned is planned.

CoWatt is still raising funds so that citizens and companies can join the 150 shareholders already involved. In April 2026 it said it aimed to raise €390,000 from the public out of a total investment of €900,000. Its shares were priced at €109 each.

The rest of the programme

The nine projects span seven municipalities:

Thouaré-sur-Loire P+R: two canopies under construction since mid-October, due in service in January 2027.
Pianoc’ktail car park, Bouguenais: works start on 9 November.
Saint-Jean-de-Boiseau, Couëron and Basse-Goulaine: end of 2026 to spring 2027.
Bouaye and car park B2 of the Nantes exhibition centre: summer 2027.

With nearly 16,000 m² of panels, these sites, plus a planned P+R in Couëron, will produce about 4.1 GWh a year. That equals the electricity use of about 3,500 people. The SAS was set up with EnR44 and the Banque des territoires. Its purpose is to help Nantes Métropole reach 20% local renewable energy by 2030 and 50% by 2050. When it was created, local production stood at 9%.

Drafted with AI assistance from the cited source. Every fact was matched automatically against the source text; it was published without an editor reading it. Tell us about any mistake and we correct it on the page.