The Central de Abasto, Mexico City's and the world's largest food market, will soon be covered by solar panels, becoming the city's largest solar power plant, as the installation has already begun, Mexico City Government Head Claudia Sheinbaum said on Tuesday.
 
"During the first phase of construction of the largest solar power plant in the city limits, we have installed 600 [solar] panels, it will be located in the Central de Abasto," Sheinbaum said on Twitter. 

Sheinbaum also stated that the completion of the power plant will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 790 tonnes.

The Mexican electricity utility CFE is designing the 18 MW project, which will be funded by Mexico's fund for energy transition and sustainable energy use.

The project will be implemented in two stages, the first of which will see the installation of two distributed generation PV systems in the market's warehouses.

The second, much larger 17 MW phase is scheduled to begin installation in May and finish by the end of the year, covering approximately 200 of the market's numerous units. The Central de Abasto will house 36,000 PV modules in total.

The Central de Abasto, which opened in 1982, covers 328 hectares (810 acres) and houses over 2,000 businesses that sell fruits, vegetables, meat, and some processed foods. Every day, the market trades over 30,000 tonnes of food products, accounting for roughly 80% of the metropolitan area's consumption.