Hanwha Q Cells has sold 33MWdc of solar farms in Panama that the company says were developed without “federal, state, local or corporate incentives”.
The utility-scale projects comprise one portfolio of three PV plants across 81 hectares of idle grazing land in the provinces of Los Santos, Cocle and Hererra. They have been sold to affiliates of Entropy Investment Management, a privately held energy investment and management company headquartered in North Carolina, USA.
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Entropy will fund equity while the projects are being constructed. Hanwha began funding the construction earlier this year, following a two-year development period. Hanwha partnered with companies including local developer Renventure and engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) partner SEMI. Meanwhile, Hanwha said it had also worked on developing the plant with the Panamanian environment authority, the transmission company EDEMET and the country’s public service agency ASEP. The plants utilise Hanwha Solar HSL polycrystalline PV modules.
The managing director of Entropy, Tyler Fauerbach, said that the acquisition would make Entropy the “largest operator” of solar power in Panama.
“These assets will have a significant impact in providing Panama with inexpensive, reliable power and reducePanama's reliance on volatile oil and hydro generation,” Fauerbach said.
Panama only saw its first major PV installation begin construction in 2012 but along with much of the wider Latin American region has seen deployment increase significantly since then. According to the Q2 2015 Latin American PV Playbook from GTM Research, the country ranked third for deployment of PV by megawatts in the second quarter.
