First Solar, Inc. announced today it has entered into an agreement to construct a 250 megawatt (MW)AC solar power plant in Riverside County, California, for a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Resources, LLC.

The McCoy Solar Energy Project will be located on approximately 2,300 acres of mostly public land provided by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) approximately 13 miles northwest of Blythe, California. Under the agreement, First Solar will provide Engineering, Procurement and Construction services, using First Solar's cadmium telluride (CdTe) photovoltaic thin-film modules.

The project is located near the 550MWAC Desert Sunlight Solar Farm, jointly owned by a subsidiary of NextEra, GE Energy Financial Services, and Sumitomo Corporation of America, currently under construction by First Solar. An affiliate of NextEra Energy Resources also previously purchased two projects built by First Solar in Canada.

Construction is expected to begin in late 2014, with completion in late 2016. The project will provide up to 400 construction jobs at peak operation.