Toshiba Mitsubishi-Electric Industrial Systems (TMEIC) has secured an order of 17 units of its SOLAR WARE 1667 outdoor PV inverters with a salt damage prevention specification for a utility scale solar power plant currently under construction on Oahu island of Hawaii.
The plant is being built by Eurus Energy America Corporation (San Diego, California), a U.S. subsidiary of Eurus Energy Holdings Corporation (based in Minato-ku, Tokyo), which is the world’s foremost company engaged in renewable energy electric utility business such as wind and solar power generation.
While the U.S. state of Hawaii is actively promoting the introduction of renewable energy, there are many cases in which utility scale solar facilities are installed near coastal areas, and up until now, PV inverters were generally installed inside an enclosure with air-conditioning to prevent salt damage.
TMEIC has developed a PV inverter with improved environmental durability for places such as islands and coastal areas where salt damage prevention measures are required. In addition to high conversion efficiency and reliability characteristic of TMEIC’s existing products, the new PV inverter developed at this time realizes a reduction in initial costs and running costs by eliminating the need for air-conditioning, and in turn, contributes to maximizing revenue.
TMEIC’s 17 units of PV inverters with a total capacity of 27.6MW were selected at this time in recognition of these performance benefits. Operation of the PV inverter units is scheduled to start from around autumn 2016.
The introduction of utility scale solar facilities is anticipated in areas such as on islands where electricity is expensive because grid parity is easy to achieve. However, equipment for such areas requires salt damage prevention measures. At the same time, it is anticipated that TMEIC’s PV inverter can be utilized not only for coastal areas but also inland areas where salt damage may occur depending on the direction of the wind.
TMEIC continues to strengthen its capabilities to respond to various installation conditions progressively being introduced throughout the world.