On this beach no one is naked

From the PV industry's upper stream, the production of polysilicon and monocrystalline silicon, to the middle stream, solar panels, and to the down stream, solar farms, four big enterprises in the city have invested in each field. The city is building another industrial park for other enterprises.

The city now has annual capacity of 5,000 metric tons of polysilicon, 10,000 tons of monocrystalline, 30 mW of solar cells and modules, the city authority says.

Wang Jianguo, deputy director of the Saihan district of Hohhot, where Zhonghuan Solar is located, says that compared with the petrochemical industry, which contributes more than 30 billion yuan worth of added-value a year, the PV industry is still small. But its rapid growth, fast-evolving technology and promising future are unrivalled.

"We are particularly interested in the conglomeration effect," Wang says. "As big companies come here, that will attract many more."

With low power prices, and abundant solar resources and premium silicon ore, Inner Mongolia is well suited to further growth in the solar industry, he says.

However, the Hohhot city authority acknowledges that the industrial cluster, concentrated on the upper stream at the moment, is yet to mature. Compared with companies dealing in solar panels and modules, upper-stream firms have much less influence on pricing and sales channels and are poor at drawing on the resources of the whole industrial chain. The next step is to use the city's advantages to lure more enterprises, especially private ones.

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