World's Largest PV Power Plant in Abu Dhabi Officially in Operation

Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates - Emirates Water and Electricity Company (EWEC), a leading company in the coordination of planning, purchasing and providing of water and electricity across the UAE, has announced that ‘Noor Abu Dhabi’, the world’s largest single solar project, with a capacity of 1,177 MW, has started commercial operation.

According to EWEC, the project will enable Abu Dhabi to increase its production of renewable energy and reduce the use of natural gas in electricity generation, helping to make energy more sustainable and efficient and reducing the Emirate’s carbon dioxide emissions by 1 million metric tons per year, the equivalent of removing 200,000 cars off the roads.

The AED3.2 billion solar plant, located at Sweihan in Abu Dhabi, is a joint venture between the Abu Dhabi Power Corporation and a consortium of Japan’s Marubeni Corp and China’s Jinko Solar Holding.

Providing enough capacity to cover the demand of 90,000 people, the plant features more than 3.2 million solar panels, installed across an 8km2 site. Beyond size, Noor Abu Dhabi broke another record at the time of bid submission attracting the world’s most competitive tariff of 8.888 fils/kWh.

The achievement of Commercial Operation Date (COD) means the plant is now completed and has started full commercial operation. To reach this milestone on time, over 2,900 people were working on site during peak construction.

Mohammad Hassan Al Suwaidi, Chairman of EWEC said: “The completion of the project marks a significant milestone in the UAE’s Energy Strategy 2050, launched in 2017, to increase the contribution of clean energy in the total energy mix to 50% by 2050 while reducing the carbon footprint of power generation by 70%. This is in line with the sector’s transformation strategy by providing alternative sources of energy that can help us improve the sustainability of the water and electricity sector.”

Source: IWR Online, 02 Jul 2019