A Swiss consortium has commissioned a ground-mounted vertical PV-plus-storage plant on an area of around 6,000 m2 in the municipality of Kaltbrunn, in the canton of St. Gallen in Switzerland.
The consortium is formed by Swiss timber company W. Rüegg AG, PV consultancy Zenna AG and solar installer Helion Energy AG.
The PV system has an installed capacity of 366 kW and a battery storage capacity of 2.5 MW/3 MWh. The screw foundations were provided by German mounting system provider K2 and the inverters were supplied by Germany-based SMA Solar Technology. The batteries are from China-based Catl Enerone.
The company that owns the land on which the project is located, W. Rüegg, explains that the facility is completely demountable, so that the land can be later used for other purposes, such as agriculture. It is located on the Baumgarten industrial site in the Fischhausen industrial centre, which is undeveloped and planned to be reserved as land for long-term business development.
“We have had two plots on the outskirts of the village for some time,” the company said in a statement. “Since one of the two plots was planned as a possible expansion of our business, but due to the long planning phases this would not be possible for another 15 years, we thought about how this land could be used in an intermediate way. The ground-mounted photovoltaic plant project therefore represents a perfect intermediate use.”
Currently, the stored energy is sold on the regulated market in Switzerland as part of the portfolio of the producer and distributor CKW, part of the Axpo Group. When the company's expansion project is built on the adjacent site, the energy will be used to supply the company itself.
The developers of W. Rüegg AG have placed great emphasis on a visually appealing construction from the outset, where optimum integration into the existing industrial environment plays an important role. As a consequence, the height of the photovoltaic system was kept as low as possible.
To avoid unnecessary glare, the solar panels are oriented to the south, have an anti-glare glass surface and are provided with anti-glare edges. The entire system will be surrounded by a visually integrated fence.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.