Huawei begins string inverter installation at 50 MW Malaysian solar farm

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Construction work is well under way at a 50 MW solar PV site in Malaysia that will become the largest installation of its kind in the country once completed.

The project is located at a stretch of undulating terrain in Kudat in the state of Sabah on the island of Borneo. Due to the specific challenges posed by the location, the developer decided to build the large-scale array using string inverters supplied by Huawei, the Chinese company that last year shipped more inverters than any other firm.

Thus far, Huawei says, 2 MW of its SUN2000-42KTL inverters have been installed, alongside smart array controllers that form part of the Huawei Smart PV Solution, which offers maximum power point tracking (MPPT) for every one or two PV strings in the array.

The impact of this is to minimize the effects of shading, which can occur on some modules at various times of the day when installed on less-than-optimum terrain. Huawei states that by reducing the reliance on components such as DC combiner boxes and power distribution cabinets too, the string solution can shorten installation times, thereby lowering overheads – which is vital in Malaysia’s fledgling solar landscape.

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Huawei has been active in Malaysia’s solar market since 2013, and has charted the nation’s emergence as a dynamic sector for PV. The hot and humid conditions of the country bring their own challenges, but recent progress at a policy level has expedited installation rates – at both distributed generation and utility-scale level.

The country is also emerging as a vibrant production hub thanks to its competitive labor rates and logistical benefits, with suppliers able to ship to India, Australia and the U.S. with relative ease.

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