Atlas Renewable Energy picks Astronergy's 454 MW n-type modules for Brazil project; AES Andes plans 379 MW solar+542 MW BESS project in Chile; 77Sol gets EDP Brasil as investor; Egasa picks Afry for 100 MW solar plant; Argentina revises financial penalties for RenovAr projects.
Astronergy modules for Brazil project: Chinese solar PV company Astronergy says it has the won the bid to supply its 454 MW ASTRON modules to Atlas Renewable Energy's 902 MW Vista Alegre Solar Power Plant in Brazil. The ASTRON panels comprise n-type TOPCon configuration and the Chinese company says this is its largest order for this technology to date. It is also the company's largest TOPCon project in Brazil. Atlas is building the project in Minas Gerais state. The Vista Alegre project is the 10th large-scale facility for which it has cooperated with Astronergy. Astronergy's Xuanyi Shi presented at the recent TaiyangNews Solar Module Innovations Conference on the company's roadmap towards achieving 34 GW+ TOPCon module capacity (see presentation here).
AES Andes unveils solar & storage project in Chile: AES Andes says it has entered a 379 MW solar power plant with 542 MW battery energy storage system (BESS) in Chile for environmental evaluation. The storage system will work for up to 5 hours. The Cristales Solar Project is planned to be located on the shores of Lake Tagua. Construction is expected to begin in Q4/2024, and commercial operations to begin in 2028.
77Sol raises funding from EDP Brasil: Commercial solar rooftop company 77Sol has secured EDP Brasil as one of its investors through the latter's corporate venture capital platform EDP Ventures in its latest round of funding. Together with independent private equity company Crescera Capital, 77Sol has raised BRL 14 million from the 2 investors.
Afry picked by Egasa for Peru solar plant: Peru's electricity utility Empresa de Generación Eléctrica de Arequipa (Egasa) has selected Swedish consultancy firm Afry to provide advisory and consultancy services for a 100 MW solar power plant in the country. According to various local reports, Afry will carry out technical and economic studies to determine feasibility of the PV park, to be completed within 180 days.
Argentina reduces penalties for RenovAr projects: Argentina's Secretariat of Energy under the Ministry of Economy has brought in a resolution that aims at reducing the financial burden of projects awarded under the country's renewable energy auction regime RenovAr. Through Resolution 165/2023 the government will lower financial penalties that projects are to pay for not coming online by the specific timeline. According to BNamericas, some of the RenovAr projects contracted by Cammesa have faced delays since early-2018 due to the economic crunch in Argentina that restricted their access to project credit thereby leading to uncertainty. Projects currently are driven by private power purchase agreements and corporate offtakers.