China’s Yingli bids for Dewa’s 100MW solar plant

China’s Yingli Green Energy, a manufacturer of photo-voltaic solar panels, said it has participated in the expression of interest for Dubai’s 100-megawatt solar power project and is also looking at other projects in the region.

The Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (Dewa) had put out a tender earlier this year for the solar power plant to expand it energy resources.

Dimitirios Bachadakis, Managing Director, Yingli Green Energy, said: “In the first stage, we have expressed our interest in the project and over the course of period we’ll ally with partners for the next stage bidding.”

He said all discussions that the company has are about potential opportunities as major utility firms are about to prepare tenders. “There are a few projects on the table. We see Saudi Arabia and other GCC countries will announce significant projects in the near future. There is a lot of information being exchanged with local and regional players but nothing concrete as yet.”

He said Masdar is expected to tender projects very soon too. Jordan already is in the process to install its first utility scale 200MW of solar energy and initiated the next steps of another 400MW.

The company is in the process of opening office in UAE and is completing legal formalities.

Bachadakis said Abu Dhabi has set a goal of generating 7 per cent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020 while Dubai’s target is 5 per cent. Across the GCC, Saudi Arabia hopes to double its installed electricity capacity by building 54GW of renewable energy by 2032, of which 41GW will be obtained from the sun. Egypt is planning to invest over $1billion into renewable energy production. Algeria is targeting 22GW by 2030.

He said Mena region is expected to invest over $50 billion by 2020 in renewable energy production from solar, wind and hydro-electric power. Out of this, 7500 MW is expected to be from solar power.

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