Power Plants

German-based manufacturer of metallization pastes Heraeus is constructing a new manufacturing site in Taiwan, the company has announced. The production site is expected to commence operation in the last quarter of 2012 and is intended to meet the demand of the Taiwanese market with local production and technical services. Heraeus produces silver pastes for polycrystalline solar cells.

Satcon will supply 30MW of its Equinox Prism Platform to Western Wind and Lord Electric. The inverters will be installed at a solar power park in Puerto Rico, the company has announced.

Konarka Technologies and Dri-Design have announced the results of their collaboration to integrate Konarka's solar panels into Dri-Design's metal rainscreen panels. It is the first application of its kind and the panels are used for façade installations. The panels will be utilized for BIPV installations and offer architects a range of possibilities of integrations into materials like glass, steel, fabrics or plastic.

According to the Hellenic Transmission System Operator (HTSO), Greece has installed 535MW of PV capacity in March 2012. This is an increase of 53MW from the beginning of the year. The HTSO published these numbers in its monthly bulletin, mentioning a power output of 61.577 MWh per year in March.

Last week Cogentrix Energy officially began commercial operation of its 30MW Alamosa CPV project in Colorado. Today, Solectria advised that it had provided over 500 large CPV pedestals, smart inverters and dual axis trackers for the project, which has been dubbed the largest high CPV generating facility in the world.

Trina Solar will supply a 2.1MW off-grid system to Longyuan New Energy in Tibet, the company has announced. The companies have entered into a supply agreement for the system in the Nagu region of Tibet. After installing approximately 40 standalone systems throughout Tibet in 2002, this is the largest off-grid project for Trina in recent times.

GCL Solar Energy has announced that it has ordered a total of 22.5MW of Satcon Equinox 500kW inverters as well as 44MW of SSB Solstice combiners to equip a 76MW PV plant in the Caribbean. Satcon will provide 55 inverters and 1,900 Solstice sub combiners, as well as 680 of its SSC Smart sub combiners. Further, the company will supply 64 medium voltage transformers.

S.A.G. Solarstrom has announced a significant increase in sales volume with a positive EBIT. The company closed the first quarter of 2012 with sales of €21.4 million (Q1 2011: €78.9 million) and an EBIT of -€2.8 million (Q1 2011: €5.1 million), claiming these results are in line with its schedule for 2012. The company states that in the previous year’s quarter, sales and EBIT had been influenced to a very great extent by the large-scale Serenissima project.

The Alamosa Solar Generating plant is being called the world’s largest concentrating PV electric power generating facility and Cogentrix Energy advised that it has finally begun commercial operation. Located in San Luis Valley in Colorado, the 30MW site produces energy for customers of Xcel Energy’s subsidiary, Public Service Company of Colorado (PSCo).

According to the latest PV System Integrators report from IMS Research, a German company held onto the top spot for the second year running. The report also demonstrated how Chinese integrators made the biggest gains in 2011, with three companies appearing in the top 10.