Posts

In collaboration with Chinese clean energy company TBEA Sunoasis, Egypt has commenced the construction of four solar power stations at the Benban Solar Park in Egypt’s southern province of Aswan. The solar stations, with a total output of 186MW, are part of the giant Benban Solar Plant which is expected to be completed by mid-2019. It is reported that the Benban Solar Plant, after its completion, aims to generate up to 2GW of utility-scale solar capacity through a total of 40 projects.

Lynn Xia, TBEA’s vice president of overseas business, told Xinhua News that the plant is going to be one of the largest in the world. Read more: Egypt’s Benban solar park to use smart solar trackers

“The responsibility is on our shoulders because we are the ones who deliver the work here,” Xia said, adding that the project is TBEA’s first in Africa.

Governor of Aswan Magdy Hegazy, who attended the project’s inauguration ceremony, revealed that the total investment of the four stations is $180 million. The Benban Solar Park, about 650 km south of Cairo, is financed by a number of global funding agencies and banks, including the the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.

The solar plant, which occupies an area of 37 square km, is anticipated to help Egypt increase its use of renewable energy to 22% of all domestic energy use by 2020. The project is estimated to help reduce global greenhouse gas emission through cutting more than half million tons of carbon dioxide annually.