THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 2, 1995 TAG: 9508020492
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KAREN JOLLY DAVIS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CAPE CHARLES LENGTH: Medium: 59 lines
A Swiss solar-panel manufacturer will open a plant in the Cape Charles eco-industrial park, attracted by state money earmarked for makers of such energy-saving systems, Gov. George F. Allen announced Tuesday.
Solar Building Systems Inc., a branch of Atlantis Energy AG of Bern, Switzerland, hopes to benefit from a state program that can allocate up to $4.5 million a year.
The company makes solar-energy collectors that are designed to replace building materials such as skylights, glass and roof tiles.
``This is exactly the kind of high-tech industry that Virginia seeks because it promotes innovative ways of addressing environmental challenges while at the same time helping to create a diverse and growing economy,'' Allen said.
The company says it will invest about $1.5 million and will hire 25 employees. For the next 18 months, while a factory is being designed and built in Cape Charles, production will start at the empty Hare Valley Elementary School outside Exmore.
``We're going to fire up in the school here in mid-September,'' said Phil Leach, general manager of Solar Building Systems. Equipment from Switzerland will arrive this month, he said.
Solar Building Systems is committed to locating in the Port of Cape Charles Sustainable Technologies Industrial Park, Leach said.
Employees will assemble solar-energy collecting cells that look like 5-inch-square computer chips. Leach said his company hopes to use state grant money to train employees through Eastern Shore Community College.
Grant money played a big part in attracting Atlantis to Virginia. The Swiss company is eligible for money allocated through the Solar Photvoltaic Manufacturing Grant Program administered by the state Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy.
This year, the General Assembly only allocated that program $500,000 of the $4.5 million allowed by law. Therefore, the amount the Swiss company might get each year depends on the state budget and the number of companies dividing the grant. That information was not available for 1995.
Local officials see Solar Building Systems as the perfect first occupant of the eco-industrial park. The company uses very little water, discharges nothing and recycles all its own waste.
``Solder smoke is the only effluent,'' Leach said about his company's manufacturing process.
Atlantis Energy AG is a $20 million consortium of eight companies that operate under the Atlantis logo, he said. One of those companies does water desalination. Another treats contaminated groundwater.
Leach agreed that Atlantis will be a handy company to have around Cape Charles now that the industrial park land on the harbor, including the site of an old town dump, is about to be tested for soil contamination. Cape Charles and Northampton County recently won a $200,000 federal grant to look for toxins and to plan a cleanup. by CNB