8 April 2014

Soitec’s CPV modules selected in over 10 new solar projects in France

Soitec of Bernin, France says that its concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) modules are included in 80% of the projects selected as a result of the second call for tenders from the French Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE, Commission de Régulation de l’Energie) for the creation and operation of solar power plants with installed capacity of more than 250kWc.

Published in March 2013, the CRE’s second call for tenders calls for the allocation of 20MWc for ground plants to be based exclusively on CPV technology, plus 80MWc of ground plants to be at least 50% CPV based, with a minimum total of 60MWc allocated to CPV.

The 16 projects finally selected after this second call for tenders represent a total volume of 102.94MWc: 13 of them (more than 80%) plan to use CPV modules manufactured by Soitec.

“It represents a volume of more than 50MWc for Soitec,” says José Bériot, VP of Solar Projects Development with Soitec’s Solar Energy division. “This success is proof that our customers recognize the performance and reliability of our modules, and our ability to achieve profitability for future power plants,” he adds.

Construction of the projects that have just been selected should be completed by spring 2016, and the winning developers are now selecting the engineering, procurement & construction (EPC) contractors with whom they will partner on the construction sites.

Soitec’s CPV technology uses triple-junction cells mounted on glass support plates. Fresnel lenses (manufactured using silicone on glass) concentrate sunlight 500 times before it reaches the cells. A metal frame holds two glass plates to form what are described as highly robust, durable and resilient modules. By combining several modules on biaxial trackers (which use a proprietary algorithm to automatically optimize their position based on the path of the sun), Soitec’s technology maximizes energy generation throughout the day. The modules achieve a yield of 31.8%, the firm concludes.

Tags: Soitec CPV

Visit: www.soitec.com