Italy’s largest PV plant goes live

Italy's largest electric utility Enel said its 6 megawatt photovoltaic plant, located in Montalto di Castro in the Viterbo province, has been completed. The plant marks the largest such facility in Italy and indicates the Rome-based company is continuing to grow its renewable energy business.

The plant, covering nearly 10 hectares (24.7 acres), is expected to generate more than 7 million kilowatt hours per year—enough for the power needs of 2,700 households. The facility's solar energy is expected to prevent the emission of about 5,000 tons of carbon dioxide annually, Enel said last week.

The power station’s panels were supplied mainly from Sharp.

Enel also has a 3.3 MW plant in Salerno, Italy, which was the country’s first large-scale photovoltaic plant. It was established in 1993 and is still operational.

The Montalto plant was designed and completed by Enel.si, a subsidiary of the Enel Group’s Enel Green Power. Enel Green Power implements renewable energy projects in Italy and worldwide in the wind, solar, geothermal, hydropower, and biomass sectors (see Enel buys wind stake in Greece). The company has nearly 4,500 MW of installed capacity, including the installation of more than 80 MW of PV plants for utilities, industrial, and domestic customers.

In 2008, Enel announced plans to build a 0.5 MW fuel cell power plant with Ansaldo Fuel Cells, a unit of Finmeccanica, Italy's largest engineering and aerospace-defense group (see Enel, Ansaldo to build demonstration fuel cell plant).

Enel also said last year it was working with Italian oil and natural gas giant Eni on a carbon capture and carbon sequestration project (see Eni, Enel team up on carbon capture).

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