OptiSolar is receiving USD78m from unnamed investors to help supply some of the most ambitious solar photovoltaic projects in the world. The money is in addition to USD132m the company received in April from undisclosed sources. The firm is expected to pump the funds into a thin-film solar manufacturing facility it is building in Sacramento at a former Air Force base.

The Sacramento Business Journal reported in March that OptiSolar plans to spend USD35m on improving the Sacramento site, and a total USD500m on manufacturing equipment. The facility will span 650,000 square feet, as much space as the two plants that rival NanoSolar plans to build in San Jose, California, and Germany. However, OptiSolar says it hopes to expand the plant to more than a million square feet by 2011, by which time it hopes the facility will employ 500 people.

OptiSolar needs the large manufacturing space in order to equip a 550MW solar farm it is planning to build in San Luis Obispo County, California. The project is much larger than what is currently the world’s largest solar farm: Juwi Group’s Waldpolenz project, which has a capacity of around 25MW rising to 40MW once it is completed. OptiSolar says construction on its project will begin in 2010. In addition, it is building a 50MW farm in Sarnia, Ontario, and two 20MW projects in nearby Petrolia and Tilbury.