Solar tracking manufacturer NEXTracker is expanding in India by manufacturing additional structural components for its solar trackers in country and taking on Indian steel tube producer APL Apollo Tubes as another supply partner.
The Flextronics-owned US firm already has four other local steel fabricators that are supplying foundation piers to NEXTracker and its customers in India.
Its trackers delivered in India will now contain 80 per cent local steel content by weight and volume and the firm claims that by localizing its steel pipe manufacturing it will save on logistics costs and decrease shipment times by up to 50 per cent.
The firm said that most of India’s 100GW by 2022 solar vision will be based on ground-mount plants, which will require steel structures. The firm, which has 20 projects in India either completed or under development, has seen demand grow rapidly and it claims that a growing percentage of developers in India now prefer single-axis trackers. The company’s Hyderabad office has also doubled in size over the last year in line with increased activity in the region.
NEXTracker has already supplied trackers to two significant projects in India, including a 105MW PV plant developed by Indian conglomerate Adani in the state of Punjab, and a 30MW solar project from Indian developer CleanMax in the state of Tamil Nadu.
