Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Energy announced on 19 August that the government has allocated 1,200 hectares of land for two solar projects in the western cities of Jeddah and Rabigh. It confirms that the two solar projects will have a combined capacity of 600MW. These will be the two 300MW projects under the National Renewable Energy Program’s (NREP) Round 2. Power purchase agreements (PPA) for the projects were announced in April (MEES, 16 April), and the plants are due to start up in 2022. The largest element of NREP’s second phase is 1.5GW at Sudair (MEES, 20 August).
At Jeddah, UAE state firm Masdar, France’s EDF Renewables and local firm Nesma picked up a PPA for a 300MW solar PV plant at US¢1.62/kWh. Meanwhile at Rabigh, Japan’s Marubeni will be developing a 300MW solar PV IPP alongside local firm Al Jomaih. The tariff here is US¢1.70/kWh. (CONTINUED - 147 WORDS)