The Brazilian Association of Photovoltaic Solar Energy (Absolar) has signed an agreement with the Brazilian Agency for Export and Investment Promotion (Apex-Brazil) to partner on attracting more foreign investment into the domestic solar industry.

Rodrigo Sauaia, Absolar executive director, told PV Tech that the partnership is a way for the Brazilian PV sector to increase its presence nationally and to present investment opportunities to major international investors.

He said it will also give more visibility to opportunities available in the Brazilian PV market for manufacturers, project developers, international financing institutions, multinational banks and development banks among others.

Sauaia added: “We are in the first phase of establishment of this sector in the country, so our collaboration is much more focused on attracting investment than in exports. The sector is too young to think about exports at the moment.”

He said the development of the sector will be focused on local markets with local demand created by both large-scale PV auctions with large-scale PV projects and also small-scale distributed generation coming from net-metering systems. He also cited self-consumption and, in a few cases, selling electricity to the free market as possibilities.

The new partnership also aims to gather data to generate strategic information for the sector and investors.

Sauaia said: “The Brazilian PV sector has an opportunity now to scale up in a similar as seen by the wind sector, which is internationally known as a success story and our expectation is that the Brazilian PV sector can follow this trend and for that you will definitely need the involvement of both national and international investors.”

David Barioni Neto, president of Apex-Brazil, said: “The partnership is important because we need the private sector to develop in Brazil. The country needs to become increasingly attractive. Foreign direct investment is critical […] to develop the chain of solar energy and to diversify energy sources."

The two organisations have already partnered at solar industry event Intersolar Europe held in Germany in June.

Brazil’s energy regulator National Electric Energy Agency (ANEEL) this week set a cap price of BRL349 (US$104)/MWh for its solar-only auction to be held on 28 August, a move which was "well-received" by the industry.

Meanwhile, the Brazilian Government's Energy Research Agency (EPE) has registered 649 solar projects totalling 20.9GW capacity for its second Reserve Energy Auction, which scheduled for 13 November this year.