Nextracker in landmark deal with Bluescope unit for Australian made solar trackers

The US-based Nextracker, one of the world’s biggest solar tracker and software companies, has announced a landmark deal with Aa company owned by Australia’s Bluescope to use locally made steel and manufacturing facilities for Australian-based solar projects.

Nextracker has a dominant share of the Australian large scale solar PV market and intends to roll out the first of its locally manufactured components for the 480 MW (p) Aldoga solar farm that is to be built in central Queensland by Spanish energy giant Acciona Energia.

The deal with Orrcon Steel, a wholly owned subsidiary of Bluescope that makes tubes and pipes, will see the torque tubing for the trackers (seen in photo above) produced at the Salisbury tube mill in Brisbane and finished at a nearby Northgate site by Baojia, which is responsible for delivering the Nextracker products.

The new manufacturing facility was officially opened on Thursday by Queensland energy minister Mick de Brenni, who highlighted the benefits of local manufacturing in the accelerating renewable energy transition.

“This investment is proof that our renewable energy and emissions reduction policies are attracting some of the world’s largest manufacturers to the Sunshine State, securing good jobs for locals,” de Brenni said in a statement.

“Orrcon’s decision to invest in Queensland sends the message to other global companies – Queensland is ready, and open for business. We’re making the materials needed to transition not only Queensland, but the rest of the world to a renewable energy future.”

Peter Wheale, the head of Nextracker’s operations in Australia, New Zealand and south-east Asia, says the company’s trackers have been entirely imported, but the new agreement will mean that up to 70 per cent of the steel needs will be locally supplied.

“In addition to reducing our carbon footprint by manufacturing critical tracker components in Australia, the manufacturing facility in Queensland will accelerate Nextracker’s ability to deliver faster to our customers in Australia and support large solar farms with quality, high performing solar tracker systems,” he said.

Wheale told RenewEconomy that the move to Australian manufacturing had been driven by local content rules, particularly those in Victoria.

But he warned that Australian-based manufacturing will command a premium over entirely imported equipment. He said more such supply deals were being negotiated, but decline to identify the potential customers.

“This is a big milestone for us,” Wheale said. “We been working with Bluescope and our partners for the last couple of years.”

The Aldoga solar farm is the first large scale solar project to be built in Australia by Acciona, which has focused mostly on wind, including what is – at least for the moment – the largest wind project in Australia, MacIntyre in Queensland.

Tony Schreiber, the chair of the Australian Steel Institute and general manager of Orrcon Steel, said Orrcon aimed to be a significant participant in Australia’s renewable energy supply chain.

“Our investment also includes a large tubular mill at Unanderra NSW, tooling to produce solar torque tubes and increased warehouse capacity, positioning our business as a key supplier of products for the rapidly expanding renewable energy sector,” he said in a statement.

” The collaboration with Nextracker and Baojia is another example of how we’re making a difference in the utility scale solar industry with an Australian made, high quality product.”

Orrcon said the manufacturing facility has been commissioned and 16 new jobs have been created to produce up to 50,000 tonnes of torque tubes, the equivalent of over 2.5GW of utility scale solar farms.  

Nextracker is ranked as the market leader for solar tracker systems in Australia with 7.45 GW (dc) installed or under fulfilment. These include the country’s biggest solar farms, New England Solar Farm (521 MW dc), Stubbo Solar Farm (520 MW dc) and Western Downs (460 MW dc).

Separately, consulting, engineering and quality control firm Enertis Applus+, said it is performing quality assurance and quality control (QA/QC) inspections on the bifacial photovoltaic modules of the Aldoga solar project.

Its advice will include pre-manufacturing, manufacturing and pre-shipment stages, totalling more than five months of activities.

This includes factory audits in China to validate the raw materials for solar PV modules and to assess the compliance of the manufacturing process with the established quality standards.