Scaling Solar

ZESCO has kicked off a tender for solar projects in Zambia’s Southern, Western, and Luapula provinces.

The Africa Solar Industry Association has recorded almost 2 GW of large scale project announcements since the start of last month with 18 countries planning new clean power infrastructure and including energy storage in the plants.

The government of Côte d’Ivoire aims to facilitate the development of 60 MW of solar at two sites via a new tender. The projects will be built under the World Bank’s Scaling Solar program.

The government wants 30% of its power from clean energy sources by 2035 and the 50 MW of solar targeted by the World Bank would make up two-thirds of that ambition.

Masdar’s latest, 400 MW solar project win followed hot on the heels of the award of the contract to develop a 457 MW solar field elsewhere in the central Asian nation.

An overview of the state of solar across the continent by trade body the Africa Solar Industry Association has highlighted a patchy policy landscape where clean power ambitions are often not followed through.

With the country’s first procurement exercise for bigger projects, the Togolese government intends to develop solar parks with a combined generation capacity of up to 80 MW. The tender is being held under the umbrella of the World Bank’s Scaling Solar initiative.

A pre-bid meeting has been arranged on January 20 for the project, which is being financed with a $74 million World Bank loan.

The African country has joined the World Bank’s Scaling Solar Program. Two PV plants will be located in Touba and Laboa, in the northeast of the country.

The facility will be developed under the World Bank’s Scaling Solar initiative on a public-private partnership basis in Herat province.