Spanish oil major Repsol has completed construction on a 637MW solar PV project in Swisher County, Texas.
The Frye Solar project, which Repsol says is its “largest” US PV plant to date, has gone online with 570MW of its 637MW capacity in operation – following the completion of construction, Repsol did not confirm when the remaining 67MW would come online.
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The site has a long-term power purchase agreement (PPA) in place for 89% – or around 566MW – of the projects total output. Repsol did not reveal the beneficiary of the PPA.
It has deployed around 1,000,000 solar modules for the project, though the company also failed to reveal the technology, configuration or supplier for these. PV Tech has contacted Repsol for confirmation.
Repsol entered the US solar market in 2021 with a 40% share acquisition of solar and energy storage project developer Hecate Energy. At the time of the deal, Hecate had a 40GW US renewable energy project pipeline.
Later in 2021, Repsol raised its long-term targets for renewables project development; the company is now targeting 20GW of deployed projects by 2030.
Much of its solar PV activity has been in its native Spain. In July 2023 the company secured €575 million (US$614 million) from the European Investment Bank (EIB) to support 1.1GW of new renewables in Spain. It has also signed a supply agreement with Spanish solar tracker manufacturer Soltec for 300MW of Spanish projects.
Elsewhere, May 2023 saw Repsol power up the first phase of a 596MW Chilean PV plant through a joint venture (JV) with renewables company Ibereólica Renovables Group, and the same month it announced a plan for 825MW of Italian solar PV.
In its Q4 2023 financial results, Repsol posted €1,195 million (US$1,276 million) in adjusted income – €16 million (US$17.08 million) of this came from renewable energy generation, or around 1.3% of total income.
