E.ON adds to Italian solar capacity

ITALY - Germany's E.ON, the world's largest utility by sales, will add 16.3 megawatts of solar power generation capacity in Italy as it aims to expand on Italy's rapidly growing solar market, it said.

E.ON said in a statement it will build four new photovoltaic installations, that turn sunlight into power, in Italy with two of them coming on stream by the end of this year and two more expected to be up and running by the end of April 2011.

The new plants will produce about 23 million kilowatt hours of power a year - enough to meet demand from 6,500 households and avoid emission of 12,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide CO2, E.ON said. The company already owns a 1.4 MW solar plant in Italy.

E.ON, Germany's biggest producer of renewable energy, said it is expecting organic growth on Italy's solar market, meaning it does not plan acquisitions there.

Italy's photovoltaic market has boomed since 2007 on the back of generous production incentives which have attracted investors ranging from families to utilities and sports car maker Ferrari.

E.ON aims to boost operating profit at its renewables unit by about 70 percent this year thanks to a massive increase in installed capacity, the unit's chief executive told Reuters last month.