China earmarks $1B solar project in Turkey

China plans to invest $1 billion in a solar power project in Turkey and is closely following the country's second Renewable Energy Resource Areas (YEKA) tender, Chinese state-run HT Solar Energy's Turkey General Manager Robin Xi said yesterday. Speaking to Anadolu Agency (AA) at the Solarex Istanbul Solar Energy and Technologies Fair, Xi said they participated in the YEKA bidding process held last year with a Turkish company but despite ranking first on the list, they could not win the tender. "We are working harder for the second YEKA tender. We are waiting for the announcement of technical details," he said.

"We are in talks with companies such as Enerjisa, Zorlu and Çalık Enerji. By creating a consortium with a Turkish company that knows the Turkish market very well, we want to enter the YEKA tender this year as well."Explaining that they are the leaders in the solar power sector in Turkey with a capacity of 600 megawatts, he added, "Our work in Turkey continues. We have calculated a $1-billion investment and we want to achieve this." He pointed to the importance of electricity storage and said that they have been working on electricity storage technologies in China for the last 30 years.

"I think these steps taken by Turkey in storage, research and development activities will be important for the country to develop its own solar energy technologies. We would like to share our experience in this area," Xi continued. He said that they have signed a distribution agreement with tech giant Huawei, covering the sales and distribution of inverters, one of the most important instruments in solar power systems in the Turkish market.

Huawei operates in areas like solar energy conversion devices, telecommunication and terminal equipment, as well as internal software.