BlueScope Australian steel components for tracking solar system

BlueScope Steel’s Orrcon Steel subsidiary will manufacture components for Nextracker solar trackers under an agreement announced today which will see the first local steel used in ACCIONA Energia’s 480MWp Aldoga Solar Farm to be built near Gladstone.

The components for Nextracker’s smart solar tracker used on distributed generation and utility-scale solar farms will be produced from BlueScope’s steel coil at Orrcon Steel’s Salisbury Tube mill in Brisbane and finished at its Northgate site by Baojia, Nextracker’s global manufacturing partner.

A new manufacturing facility for the components was officially opened by Queensland Minister for Energy and Clean Economy Jobs, Mick de Brenni.

The Chief Executive BlueScope Australian Steel Products Tania Archibald said: “As one of Australia’s largest manufacturers, BlueScope continues to invest in our Australian operations, with more than $2 billion currently committed to secure our future as a vibrant, modern and sustainable manufacturer with a clear role to play in enabling Australia’s energy transition.

“As part of this programme, we’ve been undertaking a range of climate related initiatives – not just in progressing our own ambitions for lower emissions steelmaking – but focusing on supplying our high-quality steel products that support our customers and the Australian industry more broadly participate in the energy transition.”

Nextracker GM for Australia, Southeast Asia, and New Zealand Peter Wheale said: “In addition to reducing our carbon footprint by manufacturing critical tracker components in Australia, the manufacturing facility in Queensland will accelerate Nextracker’s ability to deliver faster to our customers in Australia and support large solar farms with quality, high performing solar tracker systems.”

The manufacturing facility has been commissioned and 16 new jobs have been created to produce up to 50,000 tonnes of torque tubes, the equivalent of over 2.5GW of utility scale solar farms.

Picture: Nextracker