Petra Solar announced that it began production this month at its
manufacturing plant in South Plainfield, NJ for its supply deal with
Public Service Electric and Gas (PSE&G).
The company is making photovoltaic (PV) solar units for
installation by PSE&G on poles in its service territory, which
includes the
state’s six largest cities and some 300 rural and suburban communities.
PSE&G and Petra Solar recently entered into a contract,
valued at $200 million, which requires Petra Solar to deliver
approximately 200,000 of its SunWave units.
"With Petra Solar’s SunWave technology, they use existing
utility poles to host solar units, creating a distributed system of
power generation throughout their service area," Petra Solar President
and CEO Shihab Kuran said.
He noted that the SunWave systems not only turn the poles into solar
generators but can also communicate with the electric grid and can
offer smart grid capabilities. The systems can improve grid reliability
through real-time communications between solar generators in the field
and the utility control center. In addition, the Petra systems can
enhance electric distribution grid reliability through a host of
capabilities such as voltage and frequency monitoring and reactive
power compensation.
Petra Solar will ship 150 solar units this week, following an
initial delivery of 50 units last week. It continues to gear up to
fulfill its contract, which calls for shipments to increase to 1,500
units per month by the end of the year.
In addition to securing the PSE&G contract last month, Petra
Solar became the first business awarded funding under New Jersey’s
Clean Energy Manufacturing Fund in July, and the U.S. Department of
Energy awarded it a multi-million SEGIS contract to develop power
management and control technologies that will enable a higher
penetration of distributed solar in the electric grid.
The pole-mounted solar capacity is part of a larger $773 million proposal by PSE&G for 120 megawatts of solar.
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