Egypt’s ministry of power will offer tenders in the first quarter of 2018 for the development of solar power plants with a cumulative capacity of 500MW.
Arab and international companies presented their offers to the New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA) and the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company (EETC) to establish 100-200MW solar power plants.
However, investors are to submit their bids as competitive tenders. Tenders submitted will be through a Build, Own, Operate (BOO) scheme in Minya and Aswan.
Solar power expansion
In October, European solar power producer Scatec Solar and partners, announced the financial close for six solar photovoltaic (PV) power plants in the Benban solar park in Aswan in Upper Egypt totalling 400MW at an estimated cost of US $450m. The six plants will offset around 350,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions per year thus supporting Egypt’s emission reduction targets under the Paris Climate Agreement.
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Once completed, Benban will be the largest solar installation in the world with a planned total capacity of 1.8GW.
According to the head of NREA Mohamed El-Khayat, the country’s feed-in-tariff projects contributed to a significant leap in the field of renewable energy in Egypt, and energy projects in Egypt are attractive to investments in the current and coming period.
