Montenegro's CGES approves grid connection for 615 MW PV capacity; RoPower commissions 80 MW solar plant for Europe's 1st SMR plant; EGP Romania energizes 63 MW project; Belectric to build 28.5 MW UK plant; L&T contracts PVH for another Saudi project; Tesvolt to add battery containers for 12 MW solar farm in Germany.
Grid connection for 615 MW solar: The transmission system operator CGES in Montenegro has approved grid connection requests for 2 solar power plants with 615 MW combined capacity in the country. Sun Horizon has secured the connection for its $350 million Montečevo Solar Power Plant with 400 MW capacity that's scheduled to come online by 2027-end. Another 215 MW PV capacity will be connected to the grid by Obnovljivi Izvori Energije. The latter will bring online $180 million Prediš Solar Project under the agreement with CGES.
80 MW solar plant online in Romania: The Doicești-Şotânga Solar Power Plant with 80 MW installed capacity has come online in Romania as part of the Doicești nuclear-solar power complex. Solar power generated on-site, with over 123,000 bifacial solar panels, will energize the equipment and machinery for the NuScale VOYGR Small Module Reactor (SMR) plant to come up here as the 1st such project in Europe. To be located on the site of the former Doicești coal power plant, the 462 MWe SMR project will also use solar energy to electrify its internal services. According to local media reports, Nuclearelectrica and Nova Power & Gas established project company RoPower Nuclear has developed the solar plant.
EGP's largest solar plant in Romania: Enel Green Power Romania (EGP Romania) has commissioned the 63 MW Lumina Solar PV Plant in Romania, stating it as the largest so far in the company's PV portfolio. Equipped with some 120,000 bifacial monocrystalline solar panels from JA Solar, the project can produce around 99 GWh annually for the grid.
Belectric bags UK deal: Elevion Group company Belectric will build a large-scale solar power plant in the UK with 28.5 MW capacity with local renewable energy and battery storage developer Luminous Energy. The Bracon Ash Solar Farm is to be built near Norwich in Norfolk, England and commissioned in the summer of 2024. Belectric will deploy bifacial solar panels for the project. It will also oversee operations and maintenance (O&M) of the project once online.
PVH trackers for Saudi project: Spain's PV Hardware (PVH) has signed an 805 MW solar tracker supply deal with India's Larsen & Toubro (L&T) for a project in Ar Rass city in Qassim province of Saudi Arabia. It will supply trackers produced at the company's 8 GW Jeddah fab from where it is to supply trackers to L&T for 2.97 GW DC solar plant as part of the NEOM Green Hydrogen Project (see Major Order For PVH From Middle East).
Battery containers for German solar farm: Tesvolt will provide its battery containers with 4 MW/10 MWh capacity to Green Energy 3000 GmbH for a 12 MW solar farm in Germany in yet another collaboration for the duo. The solar project near Braunschweig is funded by the government under the country's innovation tendering scheme, said Tesvolt. The energy storage company also demands the government to lift the ban on bidirectional charging since the current tender conditions do not allow battery storage systems to store electricity from the grid. Project Manager for large-scale storage systems at Tesvolt Philipp Schreiber said, "This would also add a clear additional incentive for investing in energy storage, as operators would be able to boost their profits by selling their storage capacity. In turn, this would quieten demand from project developers for higher feed-in tariffs."