While its licensed PV power plant market has not resulted in projects of note being realized to date, Turkey’s unlicensed solar market is building momentum and the 1 GW cumulative capacity milestone looks set to be achieved this year. Tekno Ray Solar has completed installation and has officially flicked the switch on its 22.5 MW project in Konya.

"The Konya K?zören Solar Power Plant is the biggest of its kind in Turkey," said Tekno Group CEO Altay Co?kuno?lu in a statement. The $22.5 million project deploys around 74,000 modules, and Tekno Ray Solar says that it is a technology leader in Turkey, through deploying components such as a Scala monitoring system.

The project was developed under Turkey’s unlicensed solar program, under which arrays must be developed in blocks of only 1 MW. While Turkish regulators initially planned for self-consumption based projects to be developed under the unlicensed system, developers have obtained the rights to develop larger projects in multiples of 1 MW, after the licensed program failed to deliver plants at affordable prices. Licenses to develop large PV projects were issued through a bidding system, leading to unusually high license prices that made many projects unfeasible.

"This year we expect approximately 500 to 600 MW to be completed [in Turkey] so we will be almost at the 1 GW level by the end of 2016," Tekno Group CEO Co?kuno?lu told pv magazine. "All of this is through unlicensed projects, so multiples of 1 MW.

From now on things will change again and gradually we will have bigger projects. The license procedure will also change: It looks like we will be seeing more-and-more large scale projects starting up without unrealistic [license] tender price levels."

The Tekno Group and Italy’s Enerray are working in partnership on the Konya K?zören project. Enerray CEO Michele Scandellari said Tekno Ray Solar is its first foreign partner.

The May print edition of pv magazine inlcudes an extended interview with Tekno Group CEO Altay Co?kuno?lu.

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