Giant solar park in Morocco coming online

Electricity from Morocco’s giant Ouarzazate solar power plant will be added to the country’s grid for the first time in December.

The first 160-megawatt portion of the 580-megawatt will connect to the national grid in the coming days with the World Bank and the European Investment Bank providing about $9 billion in loans for the project.

Once the remaining two parts of the Ouarzazate project are operational it will be able to store energy for about 8 hours.

When the power plant is completed, it will provide electricity to an estimated one million homes.

By 2020, Morocco is aiming to source about one third of its electricity from solar power.

Dr. Hakima El Haiti, Morocco’s Environment Minister, said: “We are not an oil producer. We import 94% of our energy as fossil fuels from abroad and that has big consequences for our state budget. We also used to subsidise fossil fuels which have a heavy cost, so when we heard about the potential of solar energy, we thought; why not?”