A photovoltaic-powered cold store plant, the first of its kind, has been developed to store 10 tons of frozen fish at - 15 degreesC. It consists of a photovoltaic array (4 kW peak), a battery bank (96 V DC, 180 A H), a vapour compression refrigeration system (1 ton), electronic controls for automatic operation of plant and an insulated cold chamber. Experiments were conducted on the system to evaluate its performance with no heat load (frozen fish at - 15 degreesC) and with different heat loads. It is observed that the system can be operated with a maximum heat load of 2350 W to maintain the walk-in-cooler temperature below the freezing point of fish ( - 2 degreesC). The performance studies conducted on these subsystems viz., photovoltaic array and battery bank showed that their output has deteriorated in 5 years. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.