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A substation in Xi’an City, Shaanxi Province, China exploded around mid-night on June 18, damaging several local semiconductor manufacturing plants. Fortunately, LONGi, a Xi’an-based first-tier solar PV maker, remained completely intact thanks to the distance between its plants and the explosion location.
State Grid Corporation of China owns and operates the exploded substation. According to reports, the substation exploded due to a breakdown at around 00:25 on June 18, and it immediately caught a fire. Although the fire was extinguished in about one hour, the sudden blackout caused impact on semiconductor makers including Samsung, Micron, and Powertech Technology.
Xi’an-sited LONGi and its subsidiary Lerri Solar were both intact over the accident. EnergyTrend learns from LONGi that the explosion location was very far from LONGi’s and Lerri Solar’s plants so none of both companies were damaged or influenced.
LONGi has announced to expand its monocrystalline silicon wafer capacity from 6.8GW to 20GW by 2018 and will gradually adopt M2 Size and thin-sliced wafers. Lerri Solar, on the other hand, plans to expand 1GW of PV cell production capacity and 2GW of module capacity per year starting from 2017. Lerri Solar currently has 2GW of PV cell and module capacities, respectively.
(Photo source: Chinese netizens)