The Chinese solar modules major Trina Solar Ltd is looking for partners in India. The company would like to partner with an Indian entity that has a pipeline of projects with it, Dr Haiyan Sun, Trina’s Vice President, Asia Pacific/Middle East Area/Africa Area, told Business Line today.
Dr Sun was here as a speaker at ‘REaction 2012’ a conference of the renewable energy industry.
Asked to comment on industry rumours that Trina might take the place of BP in the erstwhile Tata BP Solar, Dr Sun merely said that Trina was talking to many companies.
Trina finds India to be a good and growing market for its product—mono and poly crystalline silicon modules.
The company is among the largest solar module manufacturers in the world, with a capacity to produce modules worth 2,400 MW, in China. He said that in India, Trina would be in a position to commit 17 per cent module efficiency. One MW of modules would produce around 1.7 million units of electricity, but of course, this would vary depending upon the location and design of the plant.
Dr Sun said that Trina could not participate in the National Solar Mission projects because of the ‘local manufacture’ condition. (Under Batch-I of Phase-I of the mission, developers were required to buy crystalline silicon modules made in India, but they could import ‘thin film’ modules. Under the second batch, even the cells, which are assembled into modules, needed to be made locally.)
However, Trina has supplied to India under other programmes, mainly the Gujarat solar programme. Dr Sun said that Trina thus far had shipped 100 MW worth of modules to India, of which around 70 MW had gone into installations, while the rest were part of projects under implementation.
The 3-day conference is being organised by Energy Alternatives India, a Chennai-based clean tech consultancy.