Juwi has announced the completion of two major solar arrays in the Czech Republic, despite the country’s hesitancy to embrace renewable energy. According to juwi, 8,000 Czechs are sayings "it's good to have the sun," now that their energy needs are being met with clean solar energy produced directly at their front door. The company, located in Wörrstadt in Rhine-Hesse, has calculated that the plants will avoid the emission of more than 4,000 tonnes of the climate-damaging greenhouse gas carbon dioxide per annum.
The first plant, located at the Hostovice I and II sites, comprise 64,000 First Solar thin-film modules with a nominal capacity of 4,800 kilowatts peak (kWp) installed at the sites approximately 130 kilometres east of Prague. The plant has been feeding electricity into the Czech grid for some time and is expected to yield about 5.4 million kilowatt hours (kWh) in the future.
The second plant is located in Trebovice and consists of 13,300 modules with a capacity of 997.5 kWp. Like the Hostovice plant, this facility was commissioned back in December 2010, but is now selling power to the grid. It is expected to produce more than one million kWh per annum.
After the successfully commissioning of the two plants, which have been in operation for ten months, power is now being sold to the company, Plain Energy GmbH. Constantin Schwab, Managing Director of Plain Energy, considers the purchase of the power plants as an important step towards pan-European diversification. According to him, a long-term engagement in renewable energies, especially in times of insecure markets, guarantees reliable returns to investors.
Although the Czech Republic is hesitatnt to support renewable energies, Jochen Magerfleisch, juwi COO, is still convinced of the Republic’s potential in this respect: “Solar power is the central element of a comprehensive supply with renewable energies. Without the construction of further free-field PV plants, Europe will not be able to reach the so much needed power supply based on renewable energies,” he said.
Besides solar, wind and bioenergy, juwi’s activities include hydropower and geothermal energy. In the wind energy sector, juwi has constructed more than 485 wind turbines with an output of more than 800 MW; in the solar sector more than 1,500 solar power plants with a total output of more than 850 MW.
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