Juwi Renewable Energies today announced that it has taken over the operations and maintenance (O&M) of the 85 MW De Aar 1 solar farm, which is located 500km north of the coastal city of Port Elizabeth.
The solar farm, the third largest under management by Juwi in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region, formed part of bid window one of South Africa’s Renewable Energy Independent Power Producers Procurement Programme (REI4P). It was commissioned for the South African grid in 2014 as Solar Capital De Aar 1 and was the largest solar project in that bid window.
“Renewable energy forms the backbone of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s energy crisis plan and we’re committed to doing our part in providing the country with clean and renewable electricity, through the O&M of De Aar 1 and other Juwi utility scale projects,” says Christos Charalampidis, head of Juwi O&M for the EMEA region. “Our goal is to operate De Aar 1 with the highest reliability and energy yield for the national grid. We’re honored to have been entrusted with this critically important solar site. The award confirms our competence, dedication, and commitment to providing O&M services that ensure that the grid in South Africa is provided with reliable renewable electricity.”
The De Aar 1 project adds to the Juwi South Africa portfolio of 400 MW of installed solar, wind, and hybrid renewables projects under operational management, and 5.5 GW globally. With the acquisition of the De Aar 1 solar farm, Juwi increased its operational management portfolio in the EMEA region to over 500 MW. This is the second “third party” O&M facility that has been awarded to Juwi.
“Juwi is now expanding its focus, which historically centered on government procurement of utility scale projects (such as those under the South African REI4P) to include the development and building of solar PV and hybrid energy solutions for mines and other energy intensive users in Africa,” says Richard Doyle, managing director, Juwi South Africa. “Hybrid solutions include energy storage, which is essential to achieving energy resilience and reliability on the continent. We have a number of leading projects close to commission and in development.”
In 2017, Juwi installed the world’s largest solar-plus-storage hybrid system at the time, for the DeGrussa copper mine in the west of Australia. The system reduced the CO2 emissions of the mine by 12,000 tons per year and helped the mine save 5 million liters of diesel per year.
