The Planta Fotovoltaico Casas de Los Pinos is a 10 MW photovoltaic power plant in Castile-La Mancha, Spain. The facility was commissioned in November 2007, and was developed by Renovalia Solar SL. The plant consists of 120 Solaria and Suntech units of 100 kW, with a total of 69,850 photovoltaic panels.

Casas de Los Pinos Solar Power Plant
Country	Spain
Locale	Castile-La Mancha
Status	Operational
Commission date	November 2007
Developer(s)	Renovalia Solar SL
Solar farm information
Type	Flat-panel PV
Photovoltaic modules	120
Power generation information
Installed capacity	10 MW

Guadarranque solar power plant (Cádiz solar power plant, Spanish: Parque Solar Guadarranque, or Planta Solar Guadarranque) is a photovoltaic solar power plant in the Guadarranque industrial park in San Roque, Cádiz, Spain. The plant is owned and operated by Endesa.

In 2007, Endesa received a municipal permit to build a 20.1 megawatt (MW) photovoltaic solar power plant. Construction on the first stage of the plant began in July 2007 and was finished in September 2008. The first stage has installed capacity of 12.3 MW and it covers 37 hectares (91 acres). It consists of 123 photovoltaic installations, each including 550 220-watt solar panels. The first stage cost €90 million and its annual generation is estimated about 24 GWh.

Electricity production at the plant will increase during the summer months due to the higher number of daylight hours. This will help to meet the significant rise in power demand in Andalusia in the summer.

Guadarranque solar power plant
Official name	Parque Solar Guadarranque
Country	Spain
Status	Operational
Commission date	September 2008
Construction cost	€90 million
Owner(s)	Endesa
Solar farm information
Photovoltaic modules	67,650
Power generation information
Installed capacity	12.3 MW
Maximum capacity	20.1 MW
Annual generation	24 GW·h

The Davidson County Photovoltaic Solar Plant will be one of the largest photovoltaic solar farms in the United States when completed in 2011. The 21.5-megawatt power station is located in the heart of North Carolina, near the community of Linwood. SunEdison will build the array of photovoltaic panels, and Duke Energy plans to buy all the output from the solar farm. The solar farm is to be located on North Carolina Highway 47, off New Jersey Church Road.

Davidson County Board of Commissioners agreed to subsidize the Photovoltaic Solar Plant project. This included $1.8 million to go into land grading and multiple cash payments beginning in July 2009, and going through 2011. Another $127 million has been raised from investors. The solar farm will create 80 jobs during construction, and three jobs will be needed in order to maintain the power facility. In addition, SunEdison will receive an annual refund of certain taxes pertaining to their various constructions due to modified legislation to include solar energy projects. SunEdison had been looking at an almost ten times larger 2,400-acre (9.7 km²) piece of land off of Interstate 85 near Lexington, but the owner declined to sell the property. However the company had already spent $134,000 researching to see if that site would work.

One of the driving forces behind the construction of this solar farm, and SunEdison's presence in North Carolina altogether, is due to a state law passed in 2007 that requires public utilities such as Duke Energy to obtain a minimum of 12.5% of their power from renewable energy by 2021. The farm has a rating of 21.5 megawatts, which translates to 18 megawatts of peak AC power. Every year that the solar farm is in use, it will offset 32 million pounds of carbon dioxide. SunEdison claims that once complete, the power plant will generate enough energy to power more than 2,600 homes.

The Mesquite Solar 1 is a photovoltaic solar power plant to be built in Arlington, Maricopa County, Arizona, owned by Sempra Generation. Phase 1 will have a nameplate capacity of 150 megawatts. The project has enough land for at least 600 MW.

Mesquite Solar 1 will use 800,000 solar panels bought from Suntech Power. The EPC contractor is Zachry Holdings. Construction is expected to begin in 2011 and be completed in 2013.Mesquite 1 is projected to generate more than 350 gigawatt-hours of electricity annually (an average power of 40 MW).

Phase 1 will cost about $600 million. SempraGeneration has chosen Suntech Power Holdings and Zachry Holdings to design and construct its Mesquite Solar 1 project. When completed in late 2012, the Arizona plant will produce 150MW of electricity and sell it to Pacific Gas & Electric under a 20-year power purchase agreement. The site is located 30 miles outside of Suntech’s new Goodyear manufacturing facility, which will provide panels for the project. U.S. EPC provider Zachry will manage the installation of the 800,000 panels during the first phase.

The Mildura Solar Concentrator Power Station is a photovoltaic (PV) heliostat solar concentrator power station is to be built in Mildura, Victoria by Solar Systems. The 154 megawatt (MW), A$420 million, project will generate 270,000 MWh per year, enough for more than 45,000 homes. It will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by approximately 400,000 tonnes per year, and will also aid in reducing salinity and create jobs during manufacture, construction and operation. Full commissioning is expected in 2013, with the first stage to be completed in 2010.

The "CS500" dish concentrator photovoltaic (PV) unit design has 112 curved reflecting mirrors, which track the sun throughout the day. The combination of mirror profile, mounting framework, and solar receiver will deliver concentrated solar energy to each PV module. The tracking mechanism allows electricity to be produced during the day whenever the sun is more than 5° above the horizon. Direct current electricity from the receivers is passed through an electronic inverter that produces grid-quality alternating current. Transformers step up the voltage to the requirement of the local network at the point of connection. Advantages claimed for this design include:

• "The CS500 dish has a longer effective operating life than traditional PV. Because the receiver is only a small area of photovoltaic (PV) (a 35 kW CS500 dish has a PV area of 0.23m² whereas 35 kW of traditional flat plate would use approximately 350m²) maintenance is simple, quick and affordable. The modules include a specially-designed filter that removes harmful UV radiation that reduces the operating efficiency and life of traditional PV technology. The modules are also cooled, which increases their effective operating life and their efficiency".

• "The CS500 dish costs significantly less (per installed watt) than traditional photovoltaic (PV) technology. This is despite the fact that the CS500 is new and still near the top of its cost curve. Advances in technology, maturity and volume production will further increase the gap".

"The CS500 produces more electricity (per installed watt) than fixed flatplate photovoltaic (PV) technology - by up to 30%. This is because it tracks the sun and operates at lower temperatures".

The California Valley Solar Ranch (CVSR) is a proposed 250 megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic power plant, to be built by SunPower in the Carrizo Plain, northeast of California Valley. Commenting on this project and a nearby 550 MW project announced at the same time, Daniel Kammen, the director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at University of California, Berkeley, said "This scale is ten times larger than what was being talked about awhile ago".

On August 14, 2008, Pacific Gas and Electric announced an agreement to buy all the power from the power plant. A Conditional Use Permit application for the project was filed with the County of San Luis Obispo Planning and Building Department on January 14, 2009. On November 30, 2010, NRG Energy announced that it would buy CVSR from SunPower for "up to $450 million". SunPower is seeking a loan guarantee from the federal government to cover the remainder of the $1 billion construction cost.

The California Valley Solar Ranch project proposes to utilize 1,966 acres (796 ha) of a 4,365-acre (1,766 ha) site of former grazing land for solar power generation, the project would utilize high-efficiency, crystalline PV panels designed and manufactured by SunPower, formerly a subsidiary of Cypress Semiconductor. The project will include up to 88,000 solar tracking devices to hold PV panels that will track the sun across the sky. The project would deliver approximately 550 gigawatt-hours (GW·h) annually of renewable energy and will have a capacity of 250 MW. While the plant would only have a capacity factor of 25%, its power would be generated during the middle of the day, when demand for electricity — and price — is much higher than at night.

The Carrizo Plain is home to 13 species listed as endangered either by the state or federal government, including the San Joaquin Kit Fox, Giant Kangaroo Rat, and the California Condor. SunPower has been working with the community to protect local wildlife habitat and migration patterns, and reduce the amount of traffic in the area during construction. The company recently announced a plan to create a reserve for Giant Kangaroo Rat in order to address concerns about habitat destruction.

If approved, the California Valley Solar Ranch project is expected to begin power delivery in 2011, and be fully operational by 2013. California utilities are mandated to get 20% of their energy from renewable sources by 2010.

The AV Solar Ranch One is a proposed 2,093 acre solar photovoltaic power project in the Antelope Valley which received unanimous Board of Supervisors approval on November 25, 2010, despite objections from defense contractor Northrop Grumman. The development will include 2.25 miles (3.62 km) of transmission lines and is "expected to provide clean energy to about 75,000 homes". According to First Solar, the project will create 400 jobs over a three year period and provide $50 million in local taxes.

When fully operational, the 230MW AV Solar Ranch One project will generate enough clean solar energy to serve the needs of about 75,000 average homes per year, displacing approximately 140,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO₂) per year—the equivalent of taking about 30,000 cars off the road.

Topaz Photovoltaic Solar Farm is a proposed 550 megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic power plant, to be built by First Solar, Inc. in the Carrizo Plain, northwest of California Valley at a cost of over $1 billion. Pacific Gas and Electric announced an agreement to buy all the power from the solar power plant. Commenting on this project and a nearby 250 MW project announced at the same time, Daniel Kammen, the director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at University of California, Berkeley, said "This scale is ten times larger than what was being talked about awhile ago".

OptiSolar, the instigator of the project, had optioned 9.5 square miles (25 km²) of ranchland, In November 2009, First Solar announced that it had purchased options to an additional 640 acres (260 ha) from Ausra's canceled Carrizo Energy Solar Farm. First Solar would reconfigure the project to minimize the use of land covered by the Williamson Act.

The Topaz Photovoltaic Solar Farm project would utilize thin-film PV panels designed and manufactured by First Solar. The project would deliver approximately 1,100 gigawatt-hours (GW·h) annually of renewable energy. The plant's power would be generated during the middle of the day, when demand for electricity — and price — is much higher than at night. The project is expected to begin construction in 2011 and be fully operational by 2014. California utilities are mandated to get 20% of their energy from renewable sources by 2010.

In late October 2010 the San Luis Obispo Department Planning and Building released a Draft Environmental Impact report for which is now accepting public comment.