Qatar Solar intends to invest more than $500m in a high-purity polysilicon production plant in the Ras Laffan Industrial City, in the country’s northeast, capable of turning out 3,600 tons of the base solar photovoltaic material annually and securing SolarWorld’s silicon supply, according to a SolarWorld announcement.
Initial production is targeted for the third quarter of 2012, and SolarWorld raises the possibility of adding other elements of the “solar value chain all the way to the finished solar power module”.
SolarWorld says the location will benefit from “excellent chemicals infrastructure”; “favourable energy prices” -- a key factor in the energy intensive production process -- thanks to abundant natural gas supplies, and a “change of thinking” on the Arabian Peninsula giving rise to...
