US solar tracker manufacturer Nextracker will supply 1.5GW of its products to a Brazilian solar PV hybrid project portfolio.
Nextracker will ship its NX Horizon-XTR all-terrain trackers and NX Horizon standard tracker systems to four PV projects owned by Brazilian wind energy company, Casa dos Ventos.
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The projects are the Babilônia Sul (117MW), Babilônia Centro (226MW), Seriemas (540MW), and Rio Brilhante (680MW) sites, located in the municipalities of Morro do Chapéu and Várzea Nova in Bahia, and Rio Brilhante and Seriemas in Mato Grosso do Sul.
Nextracker said three of the projects – Babilônia Sul, Babilônia Centro, and Seriemas – are deploying its all-terrain trackers, which are suited to hilly and undulating landscapes. Trackers for challenging terrain are increasingly common, as solar is deployed in more locations and developers look to optimise their assets. Spanish tracker manufacturer PV Hardware launched a new product this week that can handle up to 2 degrees of gradient change from one end of a row to another.
“Securing a multi-project commitment from a renewable energy leader like Casa dos Ventos reflects the growing importance of trusted partnerships when it comes to performance and long-term reliability in today’s solar industry,” said Alejo Lopez, vice president of Nextracker Latin America.
These projects are Casa Dos Ventos’ first utility-scale solar projects, a moment which the company said was a “significant step in its strategy to develop hybrid power plants that integrate solar and wind at shared grid interconnection points.”
It added that hybrid technology projects, like solar-plus-wind, are a “growing trend” among Brazilian renewables developers as they seek to optimise grid connections and project returns.
The expansion of renewables and comparatively slow investment in grid infrastructure will lead to increased curtailment in Brazil, according to analysis last month by Wood Mackenzie. The country is forecast to add over 12GW of new solar power alone this year, and curtailment of that generation is set to reach as high as 11% in some regions by 2035. This impacts the bottom line for asset owners.
Nonetheless, the sector is growing fast. In the last month alone, two investments totalling over US$200 million have supported over 700MW of new planned PV capacity from developers Atlas Renewable Energy and Scatec.
