Sempra Generation has officially opened its 48MW Copper Mountain Solar project in Boulder City, Nevada. The company also announced its recently-approved plans to expand the plant by 200MW.
SunPower and Xcel Energy have completed and commissioned the 19MW Greater Sandhill solar power plant in Colorado’s Alamosa County. Utilizing SunPower’s Tracker system, the PV power plant began to produce electricity at the end of December 2010.
Logistics giant DHL has joined forces with Lumeta and Daniel’s Electric to fit a new 88kW building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) system on a Californian high school. The 220 Lumeta PowerPly modules were installed over three days on the 35,000-square-foot roof of a recently-built classroom at Banning High School.
Lodi Unified School District and Cupertino Electric’s alternative energy division have begun building a 2MW PV system in Lodi, California. Cupertino Electric has designed the system, which is comprised of four smaller systems mounted on car park canopies across the district.
Last week, Linuo Power Group marked the opening of the first stage of its 700MW PV plant in Jinan, China with a stone-laying ceremony. The plant, located in the Shandong province, cost CNY2.5 billion and will help Linuo to achieve an annual production capacity of 1000MW.
Tenaska Solar Ventures has chosen Soitec’s Concentrix concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) technology to power its new 150MW Imperial Solar Energy Center (ISEC) West plant in Southern California, with local utility SDG&E agreeing to buy the power generated from the site under a 25-year PPA. The company also announced plans to build a 200MW capacity CPV module manufacturing facility in the San Diego area. The ISEC West project has applied for a DOE loan guarantee as well.
Energy Smart is raising the profile of solar energy in the Baltics by building a 100kWp pilot plant in Kurenurme, Estonia. Foundations for the system’s 11 tracker towers were laid last week and, when completed, they will each hold 42 solar panels.
Shams Power has closed financing on its 100MW Shams 1 concentrated solar power (CSP) project in Madinat Zayed, United Arab Emirates. When completed, Shams 1 will be one of the largest CSP systems in the world, with investment coming from 10 major financial institutions and totalling US$600 million.
BlueChip Energy has bought a large plot of land in Lake County, Florida for the development of a 40MW solar farm. When completed, the ground-mounted system will be the largest in the state and generate around 64-million kWh of electricity per annum.
Expanding Greece’s PV project portfolio, plans have been announced for the construction of 12.5MW of projects in Greece. Solaria will supply the modules for the various projects, the amount of which has not been specified, while Greek installer company Positive Energy will look after all procurement, engineering and maintenance of the plants.
