LDK Solar announced this week it has signed an EPC agreement with Guodian Longyuan Zhangye New Energy Limited for a project located in Zhangye City, Gansu. The first phase of the project commenced this month, and completion is expected by December 31, 2011. No other details are available. This agreement and project is another piece of evidence supporting the recent Solarbuzz China report saying that the Northwest Provinces will have particularly robust solar markets.
Guodian Longyuan Zhangye New Energy Limited is an affiliate of China Longyuan Power Group. China Longyuan Power Group was founded in 1993 and is primarily engaged in the design, development, construction, management and operation of wind farms. It also operates other power projects such as thermal power, solar power, tidal, biomass and geothermal energy. When I think of the company, however, I think of wind and its solar business is small at the moment.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Sunpreme gets IFC Financing for Jiaxing Facility
Solar cell manufacturer Sunpreme has closed over $50m in financing led by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector investment arm of the World Bank Group, joining existing investors including Silicon Valley-based Capricorn Investment Group and Beijing-based Tsing Capital, through its China Environment Fund III.
The capital will be used to construct a new facility in Jiaxing, Zhejiang. The city is just north of Shanghai and on the Jiangsu border. I know next to nothing about Zhejiang province's NDRC or solar policy. Jiaxing is located right in the center of China's PV manufacturing center with most of the big ten just across the border.
Jiaxing is also close to one of the many areas in China that the government likes to call their 'Silicon Valley': the Huaqiao International Business Service Park (http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-05/21/c_13308022.htm). Though calling a place a 'Silicon Valley' is the sloppiest geographical metaphor since cities all of the world were labelled the 'Paris' of some location, this area does contain the vast majority of the country's PV industry.
‘Over the past 18 months, Sunpreme has demonstrated for the first time a commercially viable metallurgical Silicon solar cell technology. Our first three US patents for the innovative device structure have been granted and we are now moving to scale production of the SmartSilicon cells in the new Jiaxing facility, near Shanghai, with world-class environmental and social management systems fully supported by the local government,’ said Ashok Sinha, Sunpreme chairman and CEO in the company's official press release.
Sunpreme said its latest commercial effort will allow it to bring its technologies to key emerging markets such as Latin America, Africa, China and India.
The Capricorn Investment Group led the initial funding round and is Sunpreme’s largest investor. China Environment Fund III is one of a series of funds established and managed by Tsing Capital since 2002, and is the first series of funds in China with a focus on cleantech and environment-related investments.
The capital will be used to construct a new facility in Jiaxing, Zhejiang. The city is just north of Shanghai and on the Jiangsu border. I know next to nothing about Zhejiang province's NDRC or solar policy. Jiaxing is located right in the center of China's PV manufacturing center with most of the big ten just across the border.
Jiaxing is also close to one of the many areas in China that the government likes to call their 'Silicon Valley': the Huaqiao International Business Service Park (http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-05/21/c_13308022.htm). Though calling a place a 'Silicon Valley' is the sloppiest geographical metaphor since cities all of the world were labelled the 'Paris' of some location, this area does contain the vast majority of the country's PV industry.
‘Over the past 18 months, Sunpreme has demonstrated for the first time a commercially viable metallurgical Silicon solar cell technology. Our first three US patents for the innovative device structure have been granted and we are now moving to scale production of the SmartSilicon cells in the new Jiaxing facility, near Shanghai, with world-class environmental and social management systems fully supported by the local government,’ said Ashok Sinha, Sunpreme chairman and CEO in the company's official press release.
Sunpreme said its latest commercial effort will allow it to bring its technologies to key emerging markets such as Latin America, Africa, China and India.
The Capricorn Investment Group led the initial funding round and is Sunpreme’s largest investor. China Environment Fund III is one of a series of funds established and managed by Tsing Capital since 2002, and is the first series of funds in China with a focus on cleantech and environment-related investments.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Solarbuzz: China's FiT Feeds "Explosive" Growth
China's national PV feed-in tariff launched this summer was expected to accelerate solar project development, and now the nation's PV pipeline stands at 14GW, says Solarbuzz in a new report.
There are 1007 nonresidential projects in China in some form of installation or development, including those tender-processed and planned without tenders. Of those, 707 are >1GW. Nonresidential PV project activity is now evident in 29 Chinese provinces. The report says the Northwest region, notably the provinces of Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, is ripe for utility-scale projects, home to 'intense solar radiation' not to mention vast amounts of land, and thus currently accounts for two-thirds (66%) of that pipeline.
The report doesn't adequately take into consideration the drive, connections effectiveness of local leadership in explaining why Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia is 'ripe for utility-scale projects'. Take Ordos, Inner Mongolia as an example. The Ordos mayor's office and municipal government's power is the main reason the First Solar utility-level PV project is located there. The Northwest's 'intense solar radiation' is a factor but nothing compared to the provincial and municipal leadership's ability to steer projects their direction.
When analyzing why one region of the country has a strongly developing solar industry and another doesn't, politics is key. The problem is those connections are very opaque. Having said that, they are not impossible to uncover and understand. Just as Kenneth Lieberthal revolutionized China watching by introducing the xitong paradigm*, the time is ripe for someone to think originally about the relationships between the center and provincial NDRC's, municipal officials, specific solar companies, Ministry of Finance and everyone else involved in renewable energy projects in China.
The Solarbuzz report acknowledges that most leading project developers are state-owned, with the top 10 firms accounting for 8.7GW of the total pipeline. I don't blame the Solarbuzz analysts for not emphasizing politics enough in their analysis. It is incredibly difficult to get good info on the inner workings of the multiple party and government institutions. Solarbuzz's main point that the earlier-than-expected release of the national PV FiT policy has opened the door to explosive growth in project development activities in China is extremely sound.
More importantly, that strong growth in domestic demand is a great opportunity to Chinese module suppliers. There are still major questions about how the FiT will be implemented. However, Solarbuzz is spot on with its analysis that module suppliers Suntech, Yingli, GD Solar and Shanghai Aerospace Automobile Electromechanical, and Sungrow Power Supply in inverters will increasingly be selling the domestic market and their business plans will no longer be so reliant on exports.
*Anyone with even a passing interest in China's politics needs to have read Kenneth Lieberthal's "Governing China: From Revolution Through Reform". Plenty of people have poked holes in his argument but he broke ground and made us look at China differently. Hopefully there are PhD dissertations being written right now that will shed light on the renewable energy decision-making process, allocation of funds and personal connections involved.
There are 1007 nonresidential projects in China in some form of installation or development, including those tender-processed and planned without tenders. Of those, 707 are >1GW. Nonresidential PV project activity is now evident in 29 Chinese provinces. The report says the Northwest region, notably the provinces of Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia, is ripe for utility-scale projects, home to 'intense solar radiation' not to mention vast amounts of land, and thus currently accounts for two-thirds (66%) of that pipeline.
The report doesn't adequately take into consideration the drive, connections effectiveness of local leadership in explaining why Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia, Inner Mongolia is 'ripe for utility-scale projects'. Take Ordos, Inner Mongolia as an example. The Ordos mayor's office and municipal government's power is the main reason the First Solar utility-level PV project is located there. The Northwest's 'intense solar radiation' is a factor but nothing compared to the provincial and municipal leadership's ability to steer projects their direction.
When analyzing why one region of the country has a strongly developing solar industry and another doesn't, politics is key. The problem is those connections are very opaque. Having said that, they are not impossible to uncover and understand. Just as Kenneth Lieberthal revolutionized China watching by introducing the xitong paradigm*, the time is ripe for someone to think originally about the relationships between the center and provincial NDRC's, municipal officials, specific solar companies, Ministry of Finance and everyone else involved in renewable energy projects in China.
The Solarbuzz report acknowledges that most leading project developers are state-owned, with the top 10 firms accounting for 8.7GW of the total pipeline. I don't blame the Solarbuzz analysts for not emphasizing politics enough in their analysis. It is incredibly difficult to get good info on the inner workings of the multiple party and government institutions. Solarbuzz's main point that the earlier-than-expected release of the national PV FiT policy has opened the door to explosive growth in project development activities in China is extremely sound.
More importantly, that strong growth in domestic demand is a great opportunity to Chinese module suppliers. There are still major questions about how the FiT will be implemented. However, Solarbuzz is spot on with its analysis that module suppliers Suntech, Yingli, GD Solar and Shanghai Aerospace Automobile Electromechanical, and Sungrow Power Supply in inverters will increasingly be selling the domestic market and their business plans will no longer be so reliant on exports.
*Anyone with even a passing interest in China's politics needs to have read Kenneth Lieberthal's "Governing China: From Revolution Through Reform". Plenty of people have poked holes in his argument but he broke ground and made us look at China differently. Hopefully there are PhD dissertations being written right now that will shed light on the renewable energy decision-making process, allocation of funds and personal connections involved.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
There was an error in this gadget
Facebook Share
There was an error in this gadget
