Evergreen Solar Inc announced it has entered into a frame agreement with Jiawei Solar (Wuhan) Co and the Wuhan Donghu New Technology Development Zone Management Committee, which calls for a significant expansion of String Ribbon wafer manufacturing in Wuhan, China. The parties expect to finalize the terms of the manufacturing relationship over the next 90 days, and plan to begin production in Q2 2010.

Under the agreement, Evergreen Solar will manufacture String Ribbon wafers using its Quad furnaces at a leased facility being built in Wuhan, China on Jiawei's campus. Jiawei will process String Ribbon wafers into Evergreen Solar-branded panels on a subcontract basis.

Initial capacity is expected to be approximately 100MW and the parties intend to expand production capacity to approximately 500MW by 2012, the timing and extent of which will be determined in 2010.