Trina Solar Limited (Changzhou, China) on August 30th, 2012  announced the completion of the first large-scale rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) system in Switzerland to use the Company's high-performance Honey modules.

The PV array, deployed on the roofs of Saegewerke Christen AG's production and storage buildings in Luthern in the canton of Lucerne, has an installed capacity of 900 kilowatt (kWp) and produces up to 6,000 kWh of solar power per day. This makes the company the first self-sufficient and carbon neutral sawmill in Switzerland.

The 6,000 square PV plant is made up of 3,576 multi-crystalline PC05A Honey solar panels rated at 260 watt (Wp) each. The modules themselves are integrated into the roof and thus provide weather protection for the building; ready-made aluminum plates ensure a waterproof connection between the individual modules.

Since July, the system has been delivering not only sufficient electricity for the sawmill, but also the equivalent of the electricity requirements of 300 households - a combined total of 900,000 kWh per year.

Saegewerke Christen AG owner, Bruno Christen said, "With the new solar power plant and our two existing wood co-generation plants, we save more than 3,000 tons of CO2 every year. That is twice as much as the emissions from our two sawmills in Luthern and Willisau."

The project in Luthern was developed by Kuesnacht-based SunTechnics Fabrisolar AG.

"We teamed up with Trina Solar because their modules have an excellent degree of efficiency," says SunTechnics CEO Felix Maag.  "The Swiss market has very particular requirements. Apart from high module output, qualities such as top performance in low-light conditions and a high snow load are key. Trina Solar products really stand out when it comes to meeting these requirements."  

During snow load testing, Trina Solar exposes its products to 10,800 pascal of pressure, while IEC standards merely require 2,400 pascal. The special surface texturing of Honey cells ensures optimized light absorption even at low levels of daylight.

2012-08-31 | Courtesy: Trina Solar Limited | solarserver.com © Heindl Server GmbH

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