By SustainableBusiness.com atSustainableBusiness.com
Funds are coming together to build the world’s largest concentrating solar plant – in Morrocco.
The World Bank approved $297 million in loans to help finance the first phase of the 500 megawatt (MW) Ouarzazate concentrating solar plant.
$200 million will come from a World Bank fund that lends to middle-income countries, and the other $97 million is from the World Bank Clean Technology Fund.
The plant will be the first in Morocco’s $9 billion solar program, launched in 2009 to mitigate climate change and for national energy security. Five other plants are planned between 2015-2020 for a total capacity of 2000 MW.
Morocco imports almost all its energy, mostly oil and coal. The Ouarzazate plant will allow the country to generate revenue from home grown energy for the first time.
“Morocco is ideally positioned to serve European markets and to use this positioning to take a technology and market lead,” says the World Bank. Hopefully, they’ll use most of the energy at home, however.
In 2009, the World Bank’s Clean Technology Fund approved a $750 million Investment Plan for Concentrating Solar in the Middle East and North Africa region. It plans to raise an additional $4.85 billion for projects in Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and Jordan.
