Latin American EPC contractors find space in larger-scale renewable projects based on a concrete operational advantage: knowledge of the terrain, local mobilization capacity, their own structures, and less dependence on subcontractors to maintain the pace of construction.
In contrast to international companies that arrive with established procedures but outsource a significant portion of the execution, direct control of engineering, machinery, and personnel can become a differentiator when projects exceed 100 MW and logistics begin to determine the schedule.
The SolarDQD case exemplifies this dynamic . The company is currently executing the EPC (Engineering, Procurement, and Construction) of El Quemado, in Las Heras, Mendoza, one of the largest solar parks in Argentina , with 305 MW of power, more than 550,000 photovoltaic panels, 40 transformer stations, and a total construction period of 16 months.
Regarding that project, the company aimed to maintain an average rate of approximately 1 MWac per day , equivalent to roughly 1.3 MWdc. This entails deploying about 2,000 modules, 25 trackers, and 250 piles daily for a year.
SolarDQD defines the operational scheme as a mobile production line . The premise is to directly control each bottleneck and reallocate resources to the critical task when external delays, weather problems, or international supply disruptions occur.
“For 300 MW, the total logistics involve approximately 1,000 containers of modules and more than 2,000 trucks carrying the structure, cables, and equipment. In terms of personnel, a 300 MW project is like managing a village of 400 people in the middle of the desert: transportation, food, water, health, security, community living, and training. The panel installation is the easy part,” explained representatives from the Argentine firm in an interview with Energía Estratégica .
“A 300 MW park isn’t delivered on the last day; it’s delivered gradually. This requires engineering, construction, and commissioning to coexist simultaneously on the same site, with parts already energized and parts under assembly. That’s what a small company doesn’t know how to manage: working alongside live installations,” they added.
To respond to this scheme, SolarDQD supports its execution with its own engineering, some 80 engineers, its own fleet and a structure that exceeds 1000 people , in addition to accumulated experience in photovoltaic parks.
However, the construction logic changes completely depending on the size of the projects, and the difference between executing 20, 50 or more than 100 MW is not only quantitative.
“Going from 20 to 100 MW doesn't multiply the project by five: you change industries. You go from managing a project to managing a supply chain,” the company emphasized.
In a 20 MW project, SolarDQD identifies a relatively conventional structure: a site manager, two or three fronts and between 100 and 150 people, with the climate and terrain as the main variables.
Above 50 MW, the need to industrialize construction arises . Procedures, simultaneous work fronts, and stockpiling planning become crucial.
Above 100 MW, the bottleneck shifts again. Management, supply chain, working capital, and back office operations become more important than the physical execution itself.
The company also identifies two particularly critical periods: the first 45 days and the last 30. At startup, any delay jeopardizes the entire timeline. For this reason, SolarDQD initially mobilizes around 40 people with prior experience to set the operational pace from the outset and avoid a lengthy learning curve.
Meanwhile, in the closing phase, the challenge shifts to the last electric mile, commissioning and start-up , where the availability of equipment itself seeks to reduce contingencies.
“The bottleneck is never where you think it is: it’s almost always logistics, not assembly. Having all the equipment available and with redundancy allows us to respond to any eventuality. Our in-house engineering is what allows us to resolve a deviation in 48 hours instead of 3 weeks. Quality isn’t inspected at the end: it’s built in with QA/QC embedded at the front end,” SolarDQD emphasized.
From EPC to generation, batteries and regional expansion
The firm, which has completed over 1200 MW and controlled more than 70% of the Argentine solar EPC market, began its regional expansion with the conviction that its model can be replicated beyond its borders.
So the big question is whether that model can be replicated in LATAM, to which they respond emphatically: "Yes, it can and we are doing it."
Argentina, Uruguay and Peru are already part of its operational map , while Paraguay and Ecuador appear among the next planned markets.
“What can be exported is the system: procedures, engineering, planning, cost control and—above all—middle management. That is the scarce asset. What cannot be exported is the large workforce, which is always hired and trained locally,” they added.
The strategy aims to bring to the region both the company's construction experience and its recent commitment to power generation, so the intention is to enter the region with the set of services and also with the generator to expand the portfolio and compete in new markets.
“The EPC is our main company, but we depend on the backlog, and this is variable. Generation provides the predictability that allows us to maintain the structure. The EPC generates cash flow, scales quickly, but is cyclical and is valued at a low multiple. Generation has recurring, contractual EBITDA, is valued at a high multiple, is leveraged with project finance, and keeps the EPC active,” they explained.
And the focus will not only be on photovoltaics, but through its commercial unit, DQD has already consolidated a milestone in BESS systems by winning 8 stand-alone projects for 149.5 MW in the “AlmaSADI” tender in Argentina (out of a total of 700.5 MW assigned after a process that received offers for +8000 MW).
“Today, EPC accounts for the majority of revenue, but the goal is for generation to account for the majority of EBITDA. The award of 149.5 MW from BESS in Chaco is the turning point in that transition,” they stated.
The combination of construction, owned assets and storage seeks to sustain a structure that already operates on a very different scale than it did two years ago.
And in that model, the goal of running 1 MWac daily functions less as an isolated productivity metric than as a result of an organization capable of simultaneously controlling engineering, supply, logistics, personnel, equipment, quality and commissioning.