Ground Breaking for 250 MW California Valley Solar Ranch (CVSR) Project

NRG Energy and SunPower celebrated the official groundbreaking of the 250-MW California Valley Solar Ranch (CVSR). The construction of the solar project in the San Luis Obispo County started in September.

The CVSR is one of the biggest central station photovoltaic plants in the world and it was announced by SunPower over three years back. This solar project is supposed to create about 350 job opportunities during the two-year construction timeline.

On completion, the CVSR project can power about 100,000 homes annually with green solar energy. PG&E will buy the solar power generated as part of a 25-year power purchase contract, which has been approved by the Public Utilities Commission of California.

Part of the operations of the project is expected to start by the beginning of 2012 and the rest of the project will be completed during late 2012 and 2013. SunPower will join hands with Bechtel to design and build the project. Bechtel offers plant engineering and procurement services along with construction services. SunPower and NRG will together maintain and operate the CVSR project for two years and then the whole responsibility will be transferred to NRG, who is the single owner of the project.

SunPower is planning to install the SunPower Oasis Power Plant product, which is an integrated and modular solar power block that can help in fast and cost-efficient deployment of large-scale solar power projects. Each of these power blocks have the SunPower T0 Tracker comprising SunPower solar panels, the Oasis smart inverter, system cabling, and the Oasis operating system.

For wireless control of the solar power plant, SunPower Oasis also integrates the SunPower advanced Tracker Monitoring and Control System (TMAC). Three solar power plants of NRG are currently operational and four projects in California, New Mexico and Arizona are under construction.