BRE National Solar Centre will relocate its offices and create its first solar test site at the Eden Project in St Austell.
BRE established the National Solar Centre in April this year, with support from the European Regional Development Fund, to drive innovation, cost reduction and increased confidence in the photovoltaic (PV) marketplace through knowledge generation.
Speaking about the relocation, Centre Director Barry Marsh said: “This exciting opportunity ends months of negotiation on various sites and will enable us to start development plans for our PV performance testing site – a very important part of what we do. Both Eden and BRE have exemplary green credentials and will be working together to provide research, consultancy and training on photovoltaics’
The National Solar Centre offices will be located in the Eden Foundation Building, with the proposed site for PV testing occupying an area of brownfield land on the perimeter of the site.
Dan James, Eden’s Development Director said: “We are delighted to welcome the BRE National Solar Centre to Eden. In a short period of time the centre has become an important research base of the national solar industry and we look forward to working in collaboration long into the future.”
He added: “There has always been an ambition from Eden to establish a cluster of environmental activity aimed at creating new businesses, delivering training provision and demonstrating new environmental technologies. The Eden site provides a unique opportunity to attract businesses and capture the growth expected within the low carbon business sector.”
The move is effective from early next year.
