FORT COLLINS -- AVA Solar Inc., the fast-growing solar panel manufacturer headquartered in Fort Collins, briefly lifted the veil on its new factory near Longmont on Saturday to accommodate a visit from Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo.

Udall joined senior AVA executives, board members and much of the company's 175-member workforce on a tour of the new plant where production has begun on photovoltaic generating modules.

The senator's visit came the day following congressional passage of the $787 economic stimulus bill that Udall said has the potential to spur a major expansion at AVA.

One of the key provisions of the package that President Barack Obama will sign in Denver on Tuesday is the so-called Advanced Energy Loan Guarantee program, designed to fund companies such as AVA that have the potential to reduce dependency on foreign oil.

"The world's biggest oil fields are controlled by people who don't really like us," Udall told his audience, adding that development of renewable resources was critical to national security. "With the Advanced Energy Loan program, we can double or triple what you have here now."

Before speaking to the group, Udall joined AVA president and CEO Pascal Norona for a tour of the company's recently completed assembly line.

The gleaming new plant machinery runs two-foot-by-four-foot glass sheets through a process where they coated with a chemical compound that can generate solar power for the same cost as traditional energy sources.

The technology was developed by three mechanical engineering faculty members at Colorado State University and is one of the examples of how clean energy research can move from CSU laboratories into the commercial marketplace.

Until yesterday, AVA had kept a tight lid on its manufacturing operation in the former Applied Films building fronting Interstate 25 just southeast of Longmont.