Imperial Valley Solar Company 1, a subsidiary of SunPeak Solar, received a US$77.4 million loan agreement from the North American Development Bank (NADB), which will go towards the construction of a 23MW solar power plant in Niland, California. Fixed-tilt polycrystalline silicon PV modules will be installed over a 123 acres located in the Imperial Irrigation District (IID). The Border Environment Cooperation Commission (BECC) certified the solar project on June 6.
A new green initiative in Brazil, titled Sistema de Energia Renovavel (SER), is planning to install 600MW of solar capacity throughout the country by 2020. SER hopes that within six years the new systems, the first of which is scheduled to come online next year, will provide electricity at prices comparable to rival energy sources.
Wafer manufacturer MEMC is to create 400 jobs by opening a new module production line in Ontario, Canada. Located in Newmarket on the outskirts of Toronto, the Flextronics-owned site will produce PV panels for the project pipeline of MEMC’s subsidiary, SunEdison.
Kauai Island Utility Cooperative (KIUC) has joined forces with Alexander & Baldwin (A&B) for the development of a 6MW utility-scale solar PV facility on Kauai’s south shore. A&B plans to have the project developed and operated by one of its subsidiaries and will sell the power produced by the plant to KIUC under a 20-year fixed PPA agreement.
A new solar pricing plan from SolarCity has sent shockwaves through the Hawaiian energy generation market by undercutting traditional utility grid electricity prices. Hawaii has the highest energy prices in the US and the new rates will bring solar electricity to residential and business users on Oahu, Maui, Kauai and Lanai from as little as US$60 per month.
Convergence Energy’s 1MW solar farm in Delavan, Wisconsin is underway, and DEGERenergie has supplied 114 of its MLD tracking systems of the DEGERtraker 6000NT for the project. Fifteen of these systems have already been implemented at the Delavan location, with the remaining 99 planned for installation over the coming weeks.
Sybac Photovoltaics has placed an order with Phono Solar for 10MW of its mono and polycrystalline silicon solar modules. The order, which will be delivered before the end of 2011, is the latest step in a strategic partnership between the two firms to install utility-scale projects throughout the US.
PV mounting and systems company Unirac has joined forces with Kyocera Solar to establish a 1.16MW PV installation on the historic Masonic Lodge of New Jersey. The system was designed by NJ Solar Power, framed using Unirac's ISYS Ground Mount (IGM) mounting solution and kitted out with 5,656 of Kyocera’s KD205 modules.
Solar Power Partners (SPP) and JCM Capital have signed a contract with Avacos Clean Energy, to provide long-term equity financing for its portfolio of rooftop solar arrays in Ontario. Funding will cover both the planning and construction of systems with a combined capacity of up to 20MW across the province.
Skyline Solar has announced the news that it has been awarded with three new patents in relation to its scalable CPV technology, two of which were awarded through the US Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) Green Technology Pilot Program. The patents take the total number of CPV-related patents to seven for the company, and include 108 specific claims regarding BOS system and LCOE cost reduction innovations.
