July 10, 2013 - Soitec announced today that they has completed construction of the 1.5MW Newberry Solar 1 project in San Bernardino County, California. Renewable power generated by Newberry Solar 1 will be sold to Southern California Edison under a 20-year power purchase agreement.
"This announcement represents a major milestone for Soitec in establishing its newest generation of CPV technology and a critical step in our ambitious deployment plans in the region," said Gaetan Borgers, executive vice president of Soitec's Solar Energy Division. "Newberry Solar 1 is the first solar power plant constructed in the U.S. with our most advanced CPV modules shipped directly from our new San Diego manufacturing facility. With a current production capacity of 280MWp and a worldwide pipeline of solar power plant projects totaling hundreds of megawatts, we're very happy to show that our new product is now shipping and can be installed and operational in a very short timeframe."
The Newberry Solar 1 power plant connects directly to Southern California Edison's distribution network.
The power plant uses Soitec's fifth generation Concentrix™ CX-S530 CPV systems. With a module area of over 100 square meters (1,130 square feet), one Soitec CX-S530 generates a capacity of 28KWp. The system utilizes 12 of the large Soitec CX-M500 modules and delivers an efficiency of 30 percent.
The 720 CX-M500 modules used at Newberry Solar 1 were manufactured in Soitec's North American manufacturing headquarters in San Diego.
