SunEdison Inc. has been awarded the right to develop an 86-megawatt solar project in South Africa in the fourth bid round of the Renewable Energy IPP Procurement Program.
The project’s capacity represents 20% of the total solar allocated to preferred bidders in this round. The Droogfontein 2 solar power plant will be located 20 kilometres south of Kimberly in the Northern Cape Province. Eskom, the South African national utility, will purchase the solar energy under a 20-year power-purchase agreement.
“Solar is a perfect solution to meet South Africa’s growing energy needs,” stated Enrique Collado, SunEdison General Manager for Africa. “Solar energy is cost competitive with fossil fuel energy, solar power plants can be brought on-line far more quickly than conventional power plants, and solar power plants are easily scalable, making them the perfect solution to help alleviate South Africa’s constrained power system.
“South Africa is one of the most attractive solar markets in the world, and we look forward to continuing to work with the Department of Energy in future rounds of the Renewable Energy IPP procurement program, which is expected to deliver an incremental 6.3 gigawatts of projects.”
SunEdison entered the South African market in 2011 and has already developed and installed 130MW of utility scale capacity.