China Merchants Venture to Invest 3 billion Yuan in Solar Farms

China Merchants New Energy Group, a Hong Kong-based renewable-energy project developer, will form a joint venture with Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps Investment Co. to invest 3 billion yuan to develop solar farms.

The venture will build about 300 MW of solar power plants in China’s western region of Xinjiang by 2015, China Merchants said in a statement posted on its website yesterday.

The plan comes after China Merchants in August agreed to partner with GCL-Poly Energy Holdings Ltd, the biggest maker of polysilicon, to develop about 973 MW of solar power projects in China.

China Merchants last year secured as much as 10 billion yuan of financing from China Development Bank Corp. to develop solar farms.