Sumitomo Corporation of America (SCOA) and its parent company Sumitomo Corporation have invested in the 550MW Desert Sunlight Solar Farm which is currently under construction in the Californian desert in the US. As a result, the companies have acquired a 25% share in the project.
PSEG Solar Source advised that its 25.2MW DC (19MW AC) Queen Creek Solar Farm has reached commercial operation. Located in Queen Creek, Arizona, the solar plant is built on 148 acres of land and uses nearly 90,000 crystalline solar panels, which operate on a single axis tracking system.
Flexopower Energies a South Africa based system integrator is using PV modules from ET Solar and a range of rooftop projects in the country. The projects include both residential and commercial rooftops which are expected to be completed this quarter.
The Export-Import Bank of the US has agreed to provide a 10-year guarantee for a PNC Bank loan worth US$6.4 million. The loan will be used to finance the export of PV modules from SolarWorld Americas, based on the west coast if the US, to Barbados-based Williams Industries-Williams evergreen Ltd.
Power Partners MasTec has chosen Solectria Renewables to provide its Megawatt Solar Stations (MSS) for MasTec’s 5MW True North solar farm in Salisbury, Massachusetts. The companies noted that the solar farm will be the largest solar installation in New England and the first direct-to-grid farm in the state.
Kyocera Solar announced that it has been tapped to deliver 30MW of its solar modules for a utility-scale solar plant being constructed in the northern prefecture of Hokkaido, Japan. Nearly 135,000 modules will she shipped for the project, which is being designed and constructed by Yonden Engineering.
Sundog Energy and Kier Construction have officially turned on the 204 kWp rooftop BIPV system at King’s Cross railway station in London, UK. Dubbed as one of the largest and most complex building-integrated PV systems in the UK, it is projected to have an output of around 175,000 kWh per annum.
Martifer Solar’s plans to expand its PV power plant projects business remains on-track after completing two of the largest PV power plants in Portugal that have a combined capacity of 22.4MWp. The project developer had around €235 million worth of projects in its backlog at the end of the first-half of 2012, with management expectation of increasing installations by a double digit amount this year, compared with around 200MW installed in 2011.
Efforts by the Chinese government to provide support to its struggling PV manufacturing sector have surfaced in Kenya, Africa, in the form of a government-approved business. Known for its municipal public works, Jiangxi Corporation for International Economic & Technical Co, Ltd. (CJIC), is planning to build a 50MW solar power project near the country’s northwest-located city of Garissa.
On September 4, Thai oil company Bangchak Public Petroleum Co. (BPP) connected its 44MW PV plant in Thailand — the largest silicon PV power plant in South East Asia, it claims. It is located in Bang Pa-In, Ayutthaya, which is around 40km from the country’s capital Bangkok.
