January 23 (SeeNews) - Bulgarian company AE Solar Horizon, part of Germany-based AE Solar, has signalled its intention to build a factory for solar photovoltaic panels in Kyustendil, southwestern Bulgaria, for an investment worth over 20 million levs ($11.1 million/10.2 million euro), the municipality told SeeNews.
The company has sought permission to acquire a 50,000 sq m land plot in the Zhilentsi industrial zone, where it plans to build a plant for PV panels with a total capacity of 1,000 MW per year, the municipality confirmed on Friday in response to a SeeNews enquiry.
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AE Solar Horizon also intends to set up an R&D centre, a business incubator for start-ups in the solar sector as well as free-of-charge training courses on solar panel installation for technicians, in addition to a local water purification station.
The planned facility will spread over a built-up area of 1.2 ha and will use electricity produced entirely from a 4 MW rooftop installation, with 2 MW required to power the production plant. The company will also build charging stations for at least ten electric vehicles.
Construction will take 18 months at most once the municipal council has voted to approve the investment proposal, the Kyustendil municipality added.
AE Solar Horizon will create over a hundred jobs at the plant and will in addition grant the municipality 100 kW of solar panels annually, equivalent to over 12% of its investment in the land plot. As part of its investment proposal, the company will complete concept and technical design projects for the potential installation of solar panels on all municipal buildings.
In October, AE Solar Horizon raised 3.5 million euro ($3.8 million) for building production plants for Tier-1 solar PV panels in Bulgaria, Greece and North Macedonia, Bulgarian investor New Vision 3 said at the time.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)