SPAIN/ TUNISIA: North Africa to harness sun's power to provide Europe with energy.

Record ID: 560852

  • Title: SPAIN/ TUNISIA: North Africa to harness sun's power to provide Europe with energy.
  • Date: 31st January 2010
  • Summary: TUNISIAN FLAG (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) ABDEL RASSAA, TUNISIAN SECRETARY OF STATE FOR RENEWABLE ENERGY SAYING: "Concerning cooperation between North Africa countries and the European market, it is aimed at creating a power grid to enable the export renewable energy and especially solar energy to a large market, the European market, which has great demand for renewable energy." SAND DUNES
  • Embargoed: 15th February 2010 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Environment / Natural World,Energy
  • Reuters ID: LVAEM6DX8I87GBJHG3GQ19BS6Q1N
  • Story Text: Answers to both climate change and energy security could be found in a new development in the solar sector: concentrated solar power. With plans for a extensive intercontinental grid linking North Africa and the Middle East with Europe, the spotlight is increasingly on renewable clean energy that can be supplied by Arab countries simply by chanelling the power of the sun.
    Desertec, steering a 400 billion euro ($600 billion) plan to power Europe with sunlight from North Africa and the Middle East, is working hard on the world's most ambitious solar power project.
    Fields of mirrors in the desert would gather solar rays to boil water, turning turbines to electrify a new carbon-free network linking Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.
    Its supporters, a dozen finance and industrial firms mostly from Germany, say it will keep Europe at the forefront of the fight against climate change and help North African and European economies to grow within greenhouse gas emission limits.
    One of the plants which in southern Spain just outside Seville is already supplying the city with some of it's electrify requirements.
    "In this plant we cool the condenser using water because in this area we have many resources for this water but in some other places where we are building solar plants like in the north of Africa like Algeria; we are using some other technologies that use to cool the condenser." said Valerio Fernandez, a member of Abengoa company that developing installations combining concentrated solar power (CSP) with combined-cycle gas power generation in different countries in North Africa.
    Southern countries that import most of their energy like Morocco, Tunisia and Jordan would also benefit from Desertec.
    Others in North Africa cities like Morocco warn of numerous pitfalls, for example, Saharan sandstorms and the risk to desert populations if their water is diverted to clean dust off solar mirrors.
    They say the concentrated solar power (CSP) technology behind Desertec involves greater costs and risks than the fast-growing patchwork of smaller-scale photovoltaic cell installations that generate most of Europe's solar energy today.
    Desertec's founders are lured by the fact that more energy falls on the world's deserts in six hours than the world consumes in a year.
    In Tunisian capital of Tunis, where on of the projects are going to be launched, Abdel Rassaa, Tunisian secretary of state for renewable energy said , that Tunis aim to generate around 550 megawatts of renewable energy.
    "The presidential project from 2009-2014 concerns generating 550 megawatts of renewable energy, and concerns the renewable energy sources of solar and wind power. Regarding solar power, the aim is to generate 100 megawatts from solar receptors in Tunisia on a concentrated level in the south of the country." said Abdel Rassaa.
    Experts said the move has been called "pivotal" in the transition of Europe, North Africa and the Middle East to sustainable energy supplies.
    "Concerning cooperation between North Africa countries and the European market, it is aimed at creating a power grid to enable the export renewable energy and especially solar energy to a large market, the European market, which has great demand for renewable energy." Added Abdel Rassaa.
    The $400 billion Euros Desertec project is said to be able to supply Europe with some power from Saharan sun as early as 2015.
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