A 2000MW solar power plant will be constructed in Tunisia that will export electricity across continental borders to Italy – a distance of just over 600km.
The TuNur network of concentrating solar power (CSP) plants will eventually form North Africa’s biggest solar generation facility; part of a plan from the DESERTEC Foundation to harness the solar electricity generating potential of the world’s deserts.
"With this important first step, we are showing the world’s governments, industries and consumers that what many thought to be science fiction is actually science fact. We hope that this is the first of many more such plants to be built in the desert regions of the world," said DESERTEC Director Dr Thiemo Gropp.
The DESERTEC Foundation has endorsed the TuNur CSP farm as an official solution to fighting climate change in the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) region. The site will ultimately reach 2 gigawatts capacity – the equivalent power of two nuclear plants – via a new low-loss submarine transmission line to 700,000 homes in Italy.
Project developer Nur Energie has identified Italy as a market requiring fast uptake of renewable energy if the country is to meet binding EU targets of 34 percent of all electricity sourced from renewables by 2020.
The TuNur plant will begin construction in 2014. It will be a standard CSP tower system on a massive scale, where fields of up to 825,000 flat glass mirrors focus sunlight onto a collection point mounted atop a tower, where the heat generated is directed to drive an electric turbine. In the arid Saharan desert, this design is superior to "trough" CSP systems and has no water cooling requirements.
Nur Energie and its Tunisian partner, Top Oilfield Services, will employ underground high-voltage-direct-current (HVDC) cabling to export electricity produced by TuNur to European markets. According to Nu Energie, voltage seepage over long distances using HVDC cabling is as low as three percent for every 1000km.
Nur Energie CEO Kevin Sara puts the number of Tunisian jobs directly linked to the project over the next four years at 20,000 and says it’s Europe switch to transporting clean energy rather than dirty fuel.
"TuNur is going to be the blueprint for things to come. It is a pioneering project that other governments, companies and individuals can point to and say, ‘Solar energy export from North Africa to Europe is possible, it’s worthwhile and the DESERTEC vision is attainable.’"
