Renewable Energy Corporation picks Singapore for World's Largest Solar Manufacturing Complex

This is a big one.

When fully operational, the complex would have a production capacity of 1.5 gigawatts, equivalent to three quarters of the global solar energy output last year, which can power several million households.

From the Singapore Economic Development Board:

With the latest decision by Renewable Energy Corporation ASA (REC) to establish the world’s largest integrated solar manufacturing complex in Singapore, and a potential investment value of S$6.3 billion, Singapore is taking a big step forward in clean energy technology.

REC plans to incorporate wafer, cell and module production facilities and has the potential to reach 1.5 Gigawatts in production capacity, roughly three-quarters of the total global output in 2006.

This world-scale investment will provide a powerful kick-start to Singapore’s efforts to develop the solar industry. It reaffirms that Singapore continues to be highly competitive in complex manufacturing activities, especially those that are capital, skill and innovation intensive.

From Channel NewsAsia:
First-ever carbon trading deal signed in Singapore

A Singapore-based company, ecoWise, has tied up with Japan's Kansai Electric Power Company to tackle climate change.
Under the four-year deal, the first to be signed in Singapore, ecoWise will trade carbon credits for Kansai, Japan's second largest power firm....

From Energy Current:
Singapore sets up clean energy research fund

Singapore's Clean Energy Programme Office (CEPO) is inviting researchers to submit proposals on "innovative and novel" clean energy ideas to bid for a S$50 million (US$35 million) research fund that is to be disbursed over the next five years. Singapore-based local and foreign research and development organisations, public sector agencies, private firms and non-profit research laboratories are encouraged to bid for the funding.

Twice a year, CEPO will identify specific themes and call for research proposals. The inaugural round starting on Nov. 2 is calling for proposals on solar energy projects. However, the subsequent rounds may include fuel cells, wind and hydro-related systems.

CEPO is part of the island-nation's push to become a centre for the development of clean energy sources, with a focus on solar energy as a key growth area. Singapore aims to generate an additional S$1.7 billion (US$1.2 billion) to gross domestic product and 7,000 jobs from a home-grown clean energy industry by 2015.

And it's not just new energy:

ExxonMobil Chemical Company broke ground at Jurong Island on its second world-scale petrochemical project in Singapore on 6 Nov 2007.

This will be ExxonMobil’s largest owned and operated petrochemical complex and the Corporation's largest integrated chemical and refining site in the world when the project is completed in early 2011. The project will employ ExxonMobil’s latest proprietary technologies and will produce a range of high value products to meet growing demand. The technology to produce high value products, including VistamaxxTM specialty elastomers and ExceedTM polyethylene will be used for the first time by ExxonMobil in Asia....MORE

Here's the Economist story on Singapore from last last week:

High-flyer
Booming, bustling and bursting at the seams

THE strong global economic tide has lifted the boats of most South-East Asian countries, but perhaps the most impressive performer is Singapore. Its national income per head is already higher than Spain's and New Zealand's, and five times that of its nearest neighbour, Malaysia. Yet in the year to the third quarter, its economy grew by 9.4%. Singapore is “a developed country that grows at developing-country rates,” as Robert Prior-Wandesforde, an economist at HSBC, puts it. Since the 1997 Asian crisis it has fared markedly better than its rival, Hong Kong (see chart).

The signs of a boom are unmissable. The shopping malls along Orchard Road are bustling. Fancy hotels are full of wealthy tourists despite cranking up their room rates. Marina Bay, by the financial district, is a forest of cranes as a $3.6 billion casino resort goes up. The Singapore Flyer, a giant Ferris wheel, looks down on the vast expanse of building site. Office rents have risen by 50% in the past year, while the price of homes is up by 28%....MORE