The C7 CPV technology employs rows of parabolic mirrors to reflect sunlight on to SunPower Maxeon solar cells. The cells have an efficiency of 22.8 percent.
SunPower claim that by using the mirrors, the LCOE can be reduced by up to 20 percent. This is because the number of solar cells required is reduced. For the one-MW system, only 172 kilowatt of solar cells will be required.
In a statement announcing the agreement, John Sullivan highlighted the C7 trackers potential to reduce costs. "As we continue to add resources to our sustainable portfolio, SRP is very interested in finding new low-cost and efficient renewable-energy technologies that can help keep our customers' prices low.
Recently the SRP has entered into three power purchase agreements (PPA) with photovoltaic suppliers. These included a 19-MW plant and a 20-MW facility, the latter being designed and built by SunPower.
The one-MW plant using SunPowers CPV technology will be built on the ASUs Polytechnic campus. Its output will be purchased by SRP from SunPower, which will then on-sell it to the ASU. The ASU plans to generate 20 MW of solar energy by 2014. As of the end of 2014, the tertiary institution had achieved 14.5 MW in photovoltaic capacity.
Popular content
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
Share
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.