On July 11, the website of the European Commission released a statement announcing that a major project for the manufacturing of PV cells and modules will be scaled up to become a “gigafactory”. Named “3Sun”, this project manufactures next-gen bifacial HJT cells and modules. Located in Sicily, 3Sun is a part of the larger “TANGO Project” that is being implemented by Enel Green Power and backed by the EU Innovation Fund. Currently, 3Sun is considered to be Europe’s first industrial-scale production site for HJT cells and modules.

Located in the Sicilian province of Catania, 3Sun currently has an initial production capacity of just 200MW per year. The expansion is scheduled to be fully completed in 2023. By then, 3Sun’s production capacity will have grown 15-fold to 3GW per year. Furthermore, it will be outputting around 5.5GWh of products per year, which is sufficient to meet the annual electricity demand from more than 2 million households. In terms of emission reduction, 3Sun will produce enough PV modules to offset 25 million tons of CO2 emissions during its first 10 years of operation.

The total investment in the project and its expansion is estimated around EUR 600 million, of which EUR 118 million will come from the EU Innovation Fund. The statement from the European Commission also said Europe is the leader in the development of HJT cells, which are regarded as a “game-changer” in the PV market due to their overall performance and energy gains. Moreover, modules based on this technology have already entered the commercial production phase.