BAKU, Azerbaijan, Mar. 26
By Nargiz Sadikhova – Trend:
ArmWind LLP company, which is a subsidiary of Italy’s Eni in Kazakhstan started the commercial production of the Badamsha Wind Farm located in Kazakhstan’s Aktobe region, Trend reports with reference to Eni.
Badamsha Wind Farm has a capacity of 48 MW and is expected to provide Aktobe region with an annual power generation of about 198 GWh, with an overall CO2 saving of 172,000 tons per year.
This project represents the tangible implementation of the Memorandum of Understanding signed in June 2017 with the Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Energy and Eni for renewable energy developments in Kazakhstan.
Eni said that Badamsha Wind Farm represents Eni’s first large-scale investment in wind and the first step of an extensive renewable presence in the country.
In 2019, Eni was awarded a further 48 MW wind farm project, as a second expansion phase of the Badamsha Project above and also a 50 MW solar photovoltaic project in Kazakhstan’s Turkestan region.
Eni has been present in Kazakhstan since 1992. Eni is joint operator of the Karachaganak field and is an equity partner in various projects in the Northern Caspian Sea, including the giant Kashagan field. Eni is the joint subsoil user and joint operator, with KMG, of the offshore exploration blocks Isatay and Abay. Equity production is currently 180,000 barrel of oil equivalent per day.
Based on some estimates, country’s potential for solar energy production ranges from 3.9 to 5.4 billion WH per year, whereas the ‘ceiling’ of wind power is 920 billion kWh per year.
As of the end of 2019, 90 RES facilities of 1,050 MW of capacity were operating in Kazakhstan including 19 wind parks (283.8 MW), 31 solar parks (541.7 MW), 37 hydropower plants (222.2 MW) and three biopower plants. This year, the number of RES facilities is to be increased from 90 to 108 with the total capacity of 1,655 MW this year.