EDF Renewable Energy has reached full power operation of its 457MW ‘Palen Solar Project’ located on public lands in the US state of California.
The solar project is co-located with a 50MW battery energy storage system (BESS) and is sited on public land of the Riverside county, which was identified as suitable for renewable energy development by the US Bureau of Land Management (BLM).
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Laura Daniel-Davis, principal deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management at the US Department of Interior, said: “As with all the Department’s clean energy projects, the Bureau of Land Management has seen this project through to completion with extensive engagement with Tribal governments, local communities, state regulators, industry and other federal agencies.”
The project first received authorisation from the BLM to construct the solar-plus-storage plant in 2018 and has been built in five phases starting from December 2020, with the latest one being the 50MW battery storage.
EDF had signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) with Shell back in 2018 for a 100MW tranche of the solar project.
The completion of the 457MW solar PV project comes less than a month after the BLM had approved the construction of the 500MW co-located ‘Oberon solar’ project in the southeastern desert of California.