ce giant Boeing is a global leader in the engineering and manufacturing of airplanes. This week, the company announced that its newest production facility will be covered with a solar panel system, and its manufacturing center in South Carolina will be powered completely by renewable energy.

The company said it has inked a deal with South Carolina Electric & Gas to buy renewable energy from a solar panel system the utility is building and will maintain. Once the photovoltaic system is constructed, it will cover a land area as big as eight football fields and will produce enough clean energy - 2.6 megawatts - to power 250 average-sized homes.

In fact, the solar panel system will be so massive that it will be the sixth-largest in the country and the biggest in the southeast. "There will be a 100 percent renewable energy site and it's the first site we have in the world that is making that commitment," Boeing Commercial Airplanes chief executive Jim Albaugh said.

The president of SCE&G, Kevin Marsh, said the company is currently installing more than 18,000 solar modules on Boeing's assembly building. U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, a republican from South Carolina, said other companies in the state and across the U.S. would likely follow Boeing in its adoption of solar power.

"The fact that Boeing would lead the way is going to make it easier for other businesses in South Carolina and in the country to follow," Senator Graham affirmed.