Independent power producer (IPP) Alight and Swedish solar company Svea Solar have inked a deal with Swedish state-owned forestry company Sveaskog to develop 2GW of solar PV projects.
Alight and Svea Solar will develop, build and co-own a portfolio of sites with Sveaskog, which will be situated on the latter’s land. Sveaskog will invest between 30% and 49% in the projects.
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Development of the first two projects, a 150-acre site in central Sweden and a 70-hectare site in the south of the country, has already begun. The two sites will be located in the SE3 and SE4 electricity zones, respectively. Sweden is divided into four electricity pricing zones, running numerically from south to north, which are designed to regulate electricity prices between more and less populated areas.
Alight did not disclose the generation capacity of these two projects under development.
The land for the projects will be converted from forest into suitable land for solar PV generation. State-run Sveaskog owns 14% of Sweden’s forests, across approximately 3.4 million hectares.
The company said that around 3 million hectares of this is productive forest land, leaving around 400,000 hectares that is of lower quality. Around 10,000 hectares (0.04% of Sweden’s total forest land) could provide 5GW of solar PV generation capacity; more than double Sweden’s current deployed capacity of around 4.5GW.
“Sveaskog’s mission is to create value from forest and land,” Erik Brandsma, CEO of Sveaskog, said. “Investing in solar power on our land is natural for us as a large landowner and a way to contribute to the energy transition and the future need for fossil-free energy sources.”
2023 was a good year for solar installations in Sweden. Data from SolarPower Europe (SPE) shows that new capacity additions rose from 960MW in 2022 to over 1.6GW in 2023. This was likely aided by strong public support for the technology, after SPE said that “80%” of Swedes want more investment into solar.
In October last year, Alight broke ground on a 100MW project in the Småland province, south-east Sweden, in partnership with French renewable power producer Neoen. At the time, the companies claimed that this project was the “largest” solar PV site to begin construction in Sweden to date.
Shortly before this announcement, Alight spoke with PV Tech Premium about its plans for expansion in the Nordic markets, particularly Finland and Sweden. Despite their northern latitude, dark winters in the Nordics give way to bright summers with long days of high solar irradiance, which Alight said offers significant potential for solar development.
This article has been updated to include Svea Solar’s involvement in the deal.
