Dubai Awards $3.9b Contract for Solar Energy Tower
David Wagman | September 18, 2017
Concentrated solar power focuses the sun's rays on a central receiving tower.
Dubai’s state energy utility awarded a $3.9 billion contract to build and run a 700 megawatt solar power plant to Shanghai Electric and Saudi Arabia’s ACWA Power.
The project will feature a 260-metre (850-foot) tower receiving focused sunlight, one of the world’s tallest such towers, the government said. The partners bid to supply electricity to Dubai for $0.073 per kilowatt hour. (Read "How Does Solar Energy Work? CSP Basics.")
The first stage of the project is due to be commissioned in late 2020. It is part of the Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum Solar Park, a complex that is projected to generate 1,000 MW by 2020 and 5,000 MW by 2030.
The government aims to use the solar park and other energy sources to increase the share of clean energy in Dubai’s power output to 7 percent by 2020, 25 percent by 2030 and 75 percent by 2050.
The solar tower will eventually open up pathways to other "clean" chemical processing, by utilizing the lower grade heat of the return salt to the heat accumulators.
It could go a long way toward helping these arid nations balance the need for power with the need for fresh water.