Abengoa Solar and Total have been selected by Abu Dhabi renewable energy company Masdar to enter into a joint venture to develop, own and operate the largest solar farm in the Middle East.
Featuring some 585,289 square metres of parabolic trough collectors, the Shams-1 (meaning "sun" in Arabic) concentrating solar power (CSP) farm will have a 100 megawatts capacity and will cover nearly 300 hectares of desert.
The facility will produce enough clean, renewable energy to supply 62,000 households with electricity.
According to Abengoa Solar, the Shams -1 plant represents one of the first steps in the region towards the introduction of sustainable energy sources in an energy market which up until this point has been largely reliant on fossil fuels for electricity generation.
Unlike traditional solar panels that convert sunlight directly into electricity, Abengoa Solar’s parabolic trough technology generates solar thermal electricity through the concentration of sunlight. Curved mirrors focus sunlight onto a tube of superheated oil. The oil is heated to around 400 degrees Celsius and is then pumped from the solar field to a nearby power block, where the oil’s heat is converted to high-pressure steam through a series of heat exchangers. This steam then drives a conventional steam turbine, creating electricity.
Construction of the Shams -1 concentrating solar power farm begins soon and is expected to be operational in 2012. Power produced by the facility will be sold to Abu Dhabi Water and Electricity Company (ADWEC) under a long-term electricity sales contract.
