ECOSOLE, one of the largest European Demonstration projects in the field of solar photovoltaics – led by the BECAR-BEGHELLI group, one of the leading innovative companies in the Italian industrial landscape – was recently launched in Monteveglio (Bologna - Italy).
The ECOSOLE project includes leading universities (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid), research institutions (ENEA, TECNALIA), large (EVONIK Industries AG), medium (AUREL SPA, Soldaduras Avanzadas SL) and small (OEC AG, PLAMTEX d.o.o.) enterprises from all around Europe and its Associated Countries - involving Italy, Germany, Spain, Slovenia and Israel - which will integrate their complementary skills and competences for tackling the challenge of producing solar electricity at higher efficiency and lower costs in Southern Europe and other sunny regions worldwide.
ECOSOLE will work towards the study, design and realization of an innovative HCPV (High Concentration PV) generator made of new high efficiency PV modules equipped with reflective mirrors and III-V solar cells and a low cost high precision solar tracker with distributed inverters. The project will also focus on the study and demonstration of new high throughput methods for the industrial realization of the whole system that will drop the production cost, to be competitive in the PV market. The new HCPV solar generators will be optimally utilized in desert areas where the standard silicon panels are less efficient, less productive and take up a bigger land area. The demonstration project will end with the installation of prototype systems in South Italy and Israel.
The project has a total estimated cost of 12M Euro, a duration of 36 months, and is funded under the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) of the EU with a 7M Euro grant.
Prof. David Faiman of the Department of Solar Energy and Environmental Physics at the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research is BGU's principal investigator in this project.
