News

FTC Solar’s 2P Voyager+ tracking system has sailed through its largest capacity Australian project so far, the Mica Creek Solar Farm in Queensland.

FTC Solar was contracted to design, certify, supply and commission 99.1MWp of its Voyager+ tracking system at APA Group’s Mica Creek Solar Farm, being built near APA’s gas-fired Diamantina Power Station in Mount Isa.

Under the guidance of EPC contractor UGL, there were around four drilling machines, five piling machines and up to 80 staff deployed on the tracker system and module installation.

Tracker installation at Mica Creek started in June this year, with the final deliveries in September for expected commissioning in March next year.

FTC Solar country manager Cameron Meekin said the tracker installation project was substantially completed, and had progressed in excellent time considering COVID lockdowns, logistics difficulties, rain events, the remote location and hard ground conditions.

“In hard conditions, this is where FTC’s Voyager+ is at its best. We have ~45% less foundations than our competitors and when you have pre-drill this is big savings. We also have 50% less man hours to build, so better for remote sites with high labour costs”, Cameron said.

Launched in early 2020, the 2P Voyager+ tracking system was designed for large frame modules such as Jinko’s 550Wp and LONGI’s 545Wp panels. As of September, more than 2GW of the Voyager+ system was installed or under contract, mainly in the United States.

Since completing deliveries for its Mica Creek contract FTC Solar was awarded a supply and delivery contract for Voyager+ at the 128 MW DC Cunderdin Solar Farm in WA. First piles are planned to be on site in the first week December, less than 10 weeks from order placement.

FTC Solar officially opened its Australian office in January 2020, and since then has also supplied trackers to two CHINT-developed solar farms in South Australia with capacities of around 5 MW each.