SunEdison has been awarded an 86 MWdc solar PV project in South Africa during the fourth bid round of the Renewable Energy IPP Procurement Program organized by South Africa's Department of Energy. The Droogfontein 2 solar power plant will make SunEdison one of the leading solar energy providers in South Africa with over 210MW of utility-scale solar power.
The Droogfontein 2 solar power plant will be located 20 km south of Kimberly in the Northern Cape Province. The 86MW capacity represents 20% of the total Eskom, the South African national utility, will purchase the solar energy under a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA). Operation and maintenance of the power plant will be performed by SunEdison Services, which provides global 24/7 asset management, monitoring and reporting services.
As Solar energy is cost competitive with fossil fuel energy in South Africa now, solar power plants can be brought on-line far more quickly than conventional power plants. Furthermore, solar power plants are easily scalable so that they are a good solution to help alleviate South Africa's constrained power system.
“South Africa is one of the most attractive solar markets in the world, and we look forward to continuing to work with the Department of Energy in future rounds of the Renewable Energy IPP procurement program, which is expected to deliver an incremental 6.3 GW of projects,” stated Enrique Collado, SunEdison General Manager for Africa.
After the completion, SunEdison intends to offer the project to the emerging markets-focused yieldco that SunEdison previously announced it plans to form.