One of the world's leading solar tracker manufacturers, Array Technologies of the US, is expanding its manufacturing footprint in the US with a new factory in Albuquerque. It will be the company's 2nd manufacturing campus in the state of New Mexico.
Array says it built its 1st manufacturing facility in Albuquerque more than 30 years ago. Now it plans to build a $50 million factory in Bernalillo County on a new 216,000 sq. ft. campus with its partners.
The official statement from Array does not reveal the annual installed capacity of the project on the west side of Albuquerque, or the commissioning timeline.
Construction is expected to begin in early 2024. Array said the 22-acre expansion will enable it to hire close to 100 new employees over the next several years.
Array has secured $2.5 million in economic assistance from the job-creation fund of the Local Economic Development Act (LEDA) to help it with land, building and infrastructure costs. Additionally, the company will get $250,000 each from the City of Albuquerque and Bernalillo County as additional funds under LEDA.
The New Mexico fab is part of the utility-scale tracker supplier's efforts to build a local supply chain in the US which, as the CEO Kevin Hostetler said earlier this year, will make it easier for its customers to meet domestic content requirement under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).
In July 2023, it signed a contract with Lock Joint Tube for locally-produced utility-scale steel tubes, and followed up with steel and aluminum supply agreements with Steel Dynamics and Extruded Aluminum Corporation (see Array Strengthening Domestic Supply Chain).
Array was next to its compatriot Nextracker in TaiyangNews 2nd Market Survey on Solar Trackers for global shipments for trackers in 2021 with a 15% share. The market survey can be downloaded for free here.