Xtreme Power to optimize Hawaii’s largest solar farm

KYLE, USA: Xtreme Power, a provider of Dynamic Power Resources (DPRs) for utility-scale power management and energy storage, today announced a collaboration with developer Castle & Cooke, Inc. to implement a 1.125 MW system on its Lana’i Island La Ola solar farm, the largest solar photovoltaic (PV) energy farm in Hawaii.

Effectively incorporating solar power is essential to the Aloha State’s ambitious renewable energy goals as outlined in the Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative. Yet incorporating renewables onto the electric grid can be challenging due to the variability of renewable resources caused by constantly changing wind and cloud cover.

Xtreme Power’s Dynamic Power Resource smoothes and controls the rate of change in renewable energy output, creating a better quality power supply that can be utilized more abundantly without adverse impact to the grid.

Since coming online in December 2008, the La Ola solar farm has been limited to delivering only 600 kW onto the Maui Electric Company (MECO) grid. With the addition of the DPR to mitigate the output variability on even the most difficult cloud days, MECO will allow La Ola to operate at its designed capacity rating of 1.2 MW, providing approximately 10 percent of the island’s electricity needs.

“Throughout the life of this project, we have searched for the best way to overcome the performance issues inherent to all solar energy installations and to yield the maximum energy output,” said Harry Saunders, president of Castle & Cooke. “Xtreme Power understood the complexity of finding the balance of our energy storage and power management needs. The Dynamic Power Resource offers an unparalleled technology solution to address those needs and cost-effectively provide more clean energy to the people of Lana’i.”

“The La Ola solar farm further demonstrates our expertise in optimizing renewable energy projects throughout Hawaii. The DPR is already enabling higher penetration of modern wind energy projects as primary sources of electricity supply in Hawaii, and we are excited to be participating in a similar role on the La Ola solar project. Castle & Cooke is truly committed to sustainable development and renewable energy projects in Hawaii and we look forward to future collaborations,” said Carlos Coe, CEO of Xtreme Power.

At full capacity, La Ola is expected to generate three million kilowatt hours of electricity per year. Installation of the Dynamic Power Resource is scheduled for May 2011.