Baku, Azerbaijan, June 6
By Fatih Karimov – Trend:
Swiss investors will manufacture Iran’s largest solar power plant in north east of the country, Alireza Sabouri, managing director of North Khorasan Electric Distribution Company, said.
The construction operations will start within four months, Sabouri said, Mehr news agency reported June 6.
Banking and insurance issues were the main obstacles ahead of starting the project, he said, adding that the problems have generally been settled and the first phase of the project with 30 MW capacity will be constructed in the city of Jajrom.
All panels will be installed in 3 months, meanwhile 4.5 months will be needed for synchronizing the power plant with the national power grid, Sabouri said.
About 60 percent of the power plant equipment including solar panels and external inverter will be imported, meanwhile 40 percent of equipment will be manufactured in Iran, he added.
The total capacity of the solar power infrastructure by Swiss company will reach 300 MW, Sabouri said.
Last fiscal year (ended on March 20, 2017), Iran added only 29 MW to renewables and brought the volume to 264 MW, which shares only 0.34 percent of the country’s total power generation capacity.
The country plans to increase the renewables capacity to 7.5 GW by 2030, of which 5 GW will be commenced in the next five years.
Iran plans to increase power generation capacity to 100 GW by 2021.
Last year, Iran’s electricity generation stood at 286 billion kilowatts/hour (kWh).