US

Japanese company to supply world’s largest CIGS solar plant

Japan's Solar Frontier K.K., a subsidiary of Showa Shell Sekiyu, will supply copper indium gallium selenide solar panels to renewable energy-based California utility EnXco for a planned150-megawatt project in Kern County. The company said the solar farm will be the largest of its kind in the world, if completed.

The two-phased project, seen delivering 60 MW of electricity by the end of the year, is estimated to be completed by June, 2013.

Solar Frontier said it has delivered the first 26 MW worth of panels in the last quarter of 2011. It is expected to generate enough electricity for 35,000 homes annually while avoiding 74,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

Showa Shell Sekiyu, the parent company, is one-third owned by the Netherlands-based Royal Dutch Shell P.L.C. It was previously called Shell Solar and then Showa Shell Solar until it changed to its current name in 2010.

The company said its labs began focusing on C.I.G.S. technology in 1993 and started mass-producing C.I.G.S. panels in 2007. To date, the company's total manufacturing capacity is 1,100 MW in three factories.

EnXco is a unit of France's EDF Energies Nouvelles. – Oliver M. Bayani