South Africa is now exploring Urban solar farms under a grant awarded by the US Trade and Development Agency.
SolarReserve South Africa Limited has been awarded the grant to advance its “Urban Solar Farms” initiative in South Africa. This is a research concerning large metropolitan municipalities and geared at providing a framework for large industrial and commercial electricity consumers with significant renewable electricity power requirements.
The grant will be used to develop up to 200MW of solar farms ranging in size from 5 to 30MW. The projects will be owned and operated by private individuals and will supply power to end users either directly or through wheeling arrangements with municipal distribution companies.
Most of the projects are ground-mounted systems, meant to address the problem of restricted roof space. The systems will be put up in place with a high demand for daily energy consumption. In addition, Urban Solar Farms will use the integration of solar power with energy storage to offer energy during demand seasons in addition to ensuring grid stability and help defer utility substation and network upgrades.
It is hoped that urban solar farms have the ability to fill an energy supply gap in South Africa for small generation projects that will guarantee a reliable, clean supply of energy for customers with big energy needs.
SolarReserve is specializes in development of energy projects and so developed a total of 246MW of solar capacity in South Africa. The company was selected by the U.S. firm Mott MacDonald, Inc., a global management, engineering and development consultancy with presence in over 140 countries, to carry out a critical research that will support SolarReserve with various technical, economic, financial, legal, regulatory, permitting and commercial inputs in order for SolarReserve to finish its strategic analysis and to progress financing and begin implementing the projects.
The agreement was signed during the US-Africa Business Forum that was held in New York City, which is focused on strengthening trade and financial ties between the United States and Africa.
