Glare from a nearby solar park forced temporary runway closures at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, prompting Dutch authorities to order the removal of about 78,000 PV modules and apply anti-reflective film to others. The solar park operator, however, decided to replace all the panels. The largest portion of the removed, near-new modules have since been acquired by BM Energy and are expected to be redeployed in projects where glare is not a concern.
The modules removed from the solar park
Image: BM Energy
In early March, the Polderbaan runway at Amsterdam Airport Schiphol was closed to incoming traffic between 10 a.m. and 12 p.m. during sunny conditions due to glare caused by nearby solar panels. Although located outside the landing area, the PV installations reportedly impaired pilots’ visibility when the sun was shining.
Following the initial operational measures and temporary runway closures, Schiphol Airport, solar park operator De Groene Energie Corridor (DGEC), the municipality of Haarlemmermeer and the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management announced in August that a solution had been identified. The plan included removing a portion of the panels and covering the remaining panels with a film designed to prevent reflection.
The Dutch government set September 2026 as the deadline for implementing both measures. “Removing, modifying and replacing the solar panels involves costs,” the ministry said in a statement. All parties involved are making a financial contribution to the measures, with the ministry contributing €6.8 million ($8.0 million).
The solar park spans approximately 100 hectares and consists of four fields. Dutch authorities ruled that DGEC must remove the panels from two of those fields, affecting about 78,000 of the site’s 230,000 modules.
Following the removal, Dutch solar company BM Energy acquired the modules as part of an organized asset transition. “We bought approximately 170,000 modules corresponding to a capacity of 110 MW,” Leen van Bellen, trade and development manager at BM Energy, told pv magazine. “But the remaining modules are also being removed.”
“The panels are n-type bifacial double-glass modules originally installed in a large-scale, ground-mounted PV system located under an aircraft approach path. The removal was initiated for aviation safety reasons and is not related to any technical or performance deficiency of the modules themselves.”
“The original project investment was in the order of tens of millions of euros, and the removal, handling, storage and remarketing of the affected modules add a substantial additional cost layer,” van Bellen added. “Schiphol offered to prefinance the temporary removal and storage as a proportional safety measure, but the financial impact for the project owner remains material.”
Despite the module replacement, the project’s total installed capacity remained the same, with the system continuing to operate using the same technology and power classes.
The removed modules are expected to be reintroduced to the market for alternative applications, including repowering projects, utility-scale developments and large commercial or industrial installations where glare is not a limiting factor.
“We expect these modules to find new applications without difficulty,” van Bellen said. “They are near-new, utility-scale Tier 1 modules suitable for repowering projects, new ground-mounted installations, commercial and industrial sites and other locations where glare constraints are not an issue. From our experience, there is strong demand for this type of asset when released in a structured and transparent manner.”
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