Great American Group Inc. is known for clearing out bankrupt retailers like Mervyn’s department stores, selling off such items as first-quality cotton polo shirts for a few bucks.

But now the Woodland Hills auction house is shining its light on more valuable inventory: equipment from shuttered U.S. solar panel plants that have gone dim as a result of low-cost competition from China.

Great American fetched $415,000 last month for such equipment as flexible-arm robots from a Tucson, Ariz., solar plant that closed in October. It also auctioned the remains of German solar company SolarWorld AG’s Camarillo plant that closed in September.

Rival auction house Heritage Global Partners of San Diego in November handled the highest-profile solar auction to date – that of Solyndra, a Fremont company that notoriously defaulted on $528 million in federal loan guarantees.

Roy Gamityan, senior vice president at Great American, said bidders are drawn to solar auctions since most of the equipment is just a couple of years old. He added that two of the pieces from the recent auction will go to plants in China.

The solar industry may continue to wax and wane, but Gamityan made this prediction: “More solar equipment will come into the marketplace.”