The travel industry will become a little more “green” as Hertz has announced its solar initiative, which aims to install 2.3MW with sixteen solar systems at their facilities located in: Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania by Q3 2011. The first project in the initiative, a 235kW solar electric system at the Denver International Airport, has already been completed and is anticipated to generate 342,766kWh of AC output.
BTU International has signed a worldwide licensing agreement to use DuPont Packaging Graphics’ catalytic oxidation technology. Developed to block volatile organic compounds (VOCs), the technology can be used in tandem with BTU’s Tritan metallization firing systems and is expected to lower the cost per watt of solar cells.
Integrated U.K. PV firm Sundog Energy has hired Bill Roberts as its new managing director and reshuffled the rest of its management team. Roberts will take over the managing director role from Sundog’s founder Martin Cotterell, who has moved into the role of chairman and technical director.
Mark Roe, formerly of Apple, has joined SolarCity as its new vice president of operations. During his time at Apple Roe was senior director of worldwide service; a position which saw him manage global service operations for new product introduction, technical training, field support and feedback, service engineering and Apple Retail service among other functions.
IC Sunshine, a division of Axio Power Holdings, has signed a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA) with Hawaiian Electric wherein IC Sunshine will sell the utility electric power from the soon to be constructed 5MW solar farm in Campbell Industrial Park on Oahu. The PPA is awaiting final approval from the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission, but sports a 20-year contract price that is fixed with slight annual increases.
Kyocera will supply 3MW of its multicrystalline silicon solar modules for two of Tohoku Electric Power’s upcoming developments in central Japan. Construction of the 2MW Shichigahama and 1MW Hachinohe plants will get underway this month and be completed in January 2012.
Southern California Edison (SCE) has signed a power purchase agreement with First Solar for its 250MW (AC) Silver State South plant. First Solar’s ground-mounted system, which will be located on 2,500 acres of public land near Primm, Nevada, will start generating electricity in 2014 and be fully operational in May 2017.
German PV equipment manufacturer Centrotherm has won the bidding to develop a major new solar plant in Algeria. Despite reports to contrary, Centrotherm has yet to sign a contract with the Algerian Government for the new system, which will be located 30km east of the capital city, Algiers.
A select group of Q-Cells employees will be presented with certificates for solar cell production monitoring by the German Minister of Finance, Dr. Reiner Haseloff, today after attending a training seminar organised by IHK Bildungszentrum Halle-Dessau.
Yingli Green Energy's Americas unit has signed a new PV module supply agreement with Borrego Solar Systems. Under the terms of the deal, 20MW of Yingli Solar crystalline-silicon modules will be provided to the San Diego-based PV systems installer in 2011. Borrego plans to use the panels for commercial projects across the U.S.
