Yingli Plans 300MW Projects in China, Suntech Lines Up Developer
Greentech Media
Yingli Green Energy,another Chinese solar company whose shares are traded in the U.S.market, doesn’t want to be left behind in what appears to be a rush toturn China into a booming solar energy market.
The company today said it has signed agreements to build newfactories and construct 300 megawatts of solar power plants. Yingli’sannouncement followed those made last week by Suntech Power and Renesola to work on roughly 2.3 gigawatts of solar power farms in various Chinese provinces.
The Chinese companies are counting on generous subsidies from thecentral government to help pay for the installation and operationcosts. Back in March, China announced incentivesthat the government said would subsidize nearly half of the cost ofputting solar on buildings (minimum project size would have to be 50kilowatts).
Yesterday, the government announced another set of incentivesfor subsidizing 50 percent to 70 percent of the cost of installingsolar power plants, but this new set of incentives would apply tolarger projects (minimum size would have to be 300 kilowatts). Thegovernment didn’t say whether the new incentives would only apply onlyto ground-mounted projects.
Yingli said it would form a joint venture with Hainan ProvincialDevelopment Holding Co., a state-owned company, to build factories toproduce 100 megawatts of silicon ingots, wafers, cells and panels inHaikou, Hainan province.
The solar company would hold an 80 percent stake in the joint venture, called Hainan Yingli New Energy Resources Co.
Yingli also has agreed to form a second joint venture with HainanProvincial Development to build and operate grid-tied solar power farmsin the province. The province’s utility, Hainan Provincial WaterConservancy & Power Group Co. would also take part in the jointventure, which is called Hainan Green Island Power Co.
Yingli plans to hold a 20 percent stake in Green Island Power. GreenIsland Power already has a project pipeline: it’s set to develop up to300 megawatts of projects from 2009 to 2011, Yingli said.
Yingli said it plans to work with a subsidiary of China GuangdongNuclear Power Holding for develop on-grid solar power plants in Chinaand elsewhere in the world.
Also today, Suntech said it has lined up a developer to develop 500megawatts of ground-mounted and rooftop projects. Suntech said theprojects might include some of the 1.8 gigawatts, ground-mountedprojects it announced last week.
The developer is China Huadian New Energy Development Co., whichwould work on financing and overseeing the project development. Suntechwould provide the crystalline silicon solar panels and design thesystems.
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