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First large photovoltaic farm in western Romania opens at Buzias
The first large photovoltaic farm in western Romania opened at Buzias on Friday; it can provide the electric power to 1,000 families in the town for a year.
The investment amounts to 2 million euros and was achieved by Constructim company based in Timisoara.
Constructim officials said the project was implemented at Buzias because the company already owned the required land and such land was meeting all the technical requirements.
'We decided to invest in a pronounced eco-friendly project, because solar light represents a genuine endless source of green energy, available on a large scale and which involves a lot less risks than nuclear energy, in spite of the higher production costs', Constructim manager Lucian Petrescu told the opening ceremony.
The photovoltaic farm has 1 megawatt/hour power and it has been operational for a week. The 3,800 photovoltaic panels are set on an overall covered area of 19,000 square metres.
In terms of technical solution, the building firm chose to use Siliken panels over cheaper ones from China, out of the wish to encourage the domestic production of photovoltaic panels. Spanish company Siliken has a factory in Timisoara employing 260 workers.
'The Spanish investors opened the factory in Timisoara as they sensed the potential of this market and anticipated a development of the renewable energy sector in Romania. For the time being, the entire output made here has been shipped to foreign markets. The Buzias farm is a new key moment for us, since it is the first Romanian project achieved with our products', Siliken manufacturing manager Salvador Sarrias stressed.
Constructim is by no means ending its investments in green energy, given that after it opened a 9-megawatt/hour wind farm in Oravita (western Romania) last year, it is now prospecting the market in order to build another 12.5-megawatt/hour one in the area, for which European Union funds have also been attracted. Also being developed are several solar power-based projects in Timis county as well as micro-hydro-electric stations in the nearby Caras Severin county.