165 Million Liras Investment in Solar Energy

Yılmaz, General Manager of CW Enerjioperating in Antalya, reported that they commissioned the new solar energy panel factory with an investment of 165 million liras.

Volkan Yılmaz, General Manager of CW Enerji, which operates in Antalya Organised Industrial Zone, told AA correspondent that they contribute to closing the current account deficit with the solar panels they produce, the investments they make and the products they export.

Noting thatCWEnergy is among the largest solar panel manufacturers in Türkiye and Europe, Yılmaz said that their production capacity was 450 megawatts until about a year ago, and that they have now reached 750 megawatts.

Stating that they export to 15 countries as a company, Yılmaz said:

‘We will increase our exports to many countries of the world, from Morocco to Tunisia, from Ghana to Germany, from Syria to Kosovo, to 30 countries in 2019 and 40 countries in 2020. Of course, when we open up to exports, we come across our competitors in the international arena. We compete with them in terms of quality, and we are even better than many of them. Of course, it is not easy to compete in terms of price. In order to compete with them, we increased our production capacity to 750 megawatts. We will increase our capacity to 1 gigawatt very soon. For this, we have implemented our new 100 percent automation-oriented factory in accordance with ‘Industry 4.0’ norms. Thanks to our factory, we will both keep the quality at a much more optimum point and we will be able to compete internationally with Chinese manufacturers, our biggest competitor, by saving 3 out of 4 in the number of employees.’

‘Transition to solar energy is mandatory’

Emphasising that the factory is a very important investment for Türkiye and European energy markets, Yılmaz said, ‘We have commissioned our new factory in Antalya with an investment of 165 million liras. Two robotic machines will be able to do a job that previously could be done by 50 workers much faster and with higher quality. Thanks to the 100 percent automation investment, 400 production employees were saved and labour costs were significantly reduced.’

Yılmaz stated that solar power plants were a matter of preference until 5-6 years ago, but this situation has now become a necessity, ‘Now not only in Türkiye, all developed and developing countries in the world have to switch to solar energy in electricity generation.’

Stating that the first stage of the factory has started production, Yılmaz said that they will soon move the machines in the other factory and make the new facility fully operational.

Yılmaz added that they aim to increase the annual production capacity of the factory by 30 per cent every year and increase the number of employment in the next two years.