On August 24th, 2010, the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) approved power purchase agreements by Tuscon Electric Power Co. (TEP, Tuscon, Arizona, US) for five solar photovoltaic (PV) plants and three concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) plants, to total 97MW of new generating capacity. With the approval of the PPAs, developers can now proceed with finalizing financing and land rights, with the goal of completing projects and connecting some of these plants to the grid in 2011 and 2012. "These systems will dramatically expand our renewable energy assets, helping us meet or even beat our state goals while establishing TEP as a national leader in solar energy", said Paul Bonavia, chairman, president and CEO of TEP and its parent company, UniSource Energy Corporation (Tuscon, Arizona, US). 

PV plants to include fixed and single-axis tracking designs

The news plants will dramatically increase TEP's solar generating capacity; the five PV plants approved have a greater capacity at 81MW than the entire 67MW of utility-scale PV installed in the United States in 2009. The five PV plants will include three with fixed PV arrays at 35MW, 25MW and 5MW, and two single-axis tracking systems at 12MW and 4MW.

The three CPV plants work by concentrating sunlight upon a photovoltaic material to generate electricity. CPV plants are much less common than traditional PV or concentrating solar power (CSP) plants, and at a total of 16MW these three plants could significantly increase CPV capacity in the US.

These eight plants will join a bio-gas plant and a wind farm for a total of 10 renewable energy PPAs totaling 150MW approved by the ACC for utility in the Tuscon Area.

New solar PPAs to complement other solar development by TEP

These solar plants will join two other PV plants totaling 30MW already under construction in the Tuscon area as well as TEP's existing 4.6MW Springerville Generating Station, a PV plant to which the company plans to add 1.8MW of capacity. TEP has also announced plans to build a 1.6MW PV plant with single-axis tracking at the University of Arizona's Science and Technology Park. Finally, the company notes that it has supported 17MW of customer-installed renewable energy through its SunShare program.

TEP states that these plants will allow it to exceed its renewable energy goals under Arizona's renewable electricity standard (RES, the same as a renewable portfolio standard or RPS), which requires utilities to purchase or generate an increasing portion of electricity with renewable energy sources or pay fines. Arizona's RES sets a mandate of 15% renewable energy by 2025, with extra credit for using solar technologies to reach these goals.

2010-08-30| Courtesy:Tuscon Electric Power  | solarserver.com © Heindl Server GmbH

Our editorial selection of breaking solar news is published at:
www.solarserver.com/solar-magazine/solar-news/top-solar-news.html