TotalEnergies has completed works on its 800MW Al Kharsaah solar power plant near Doha, Qatar and has already connected it to the grid.
The project, which TotalEnergies claimed was the first large-scale solar PV plant in the country, was constructed in a 1,000-hectare area and contains two million bifacial modules mounted on single-axis trackers.
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Developed by Siraj 1 – 40% owned by a consortium formed by TotalEnergies (49%) and Marubeni (51%) and 60% owned by Siraj Energy, a QatarEnergy subsidiary – the project has signed a 25-year power purchase agreement (PPA) with power grid operator Kahramaa and will cover up to 10% of Qatar’s peak power consumption.
The operator had secured in 2020, through a tender, what was hailed as a record-breaking low tariff at the time with QAR0.0571/kWh (US$0.01569/kWh).
Other large-scale projects are currently underway in the industrial cities of Mesaieed and Ras Laffan in Qatar, with a combined capacity of 875MW. They are expected to be operational by the end of 2024.
Patrick Pouyanné, chairman and CEO of TotalEnergies, said: “This is another milestone in our long-standing and trustful relationship with QatarEnergy, also bringing us closer to our goal of 35GW of production capacity by 2025.”
Moreover, in its ambition to reach net-zero by 2050, TotalEnergies is building a renewables portfolio of 100GW by 2030 and has currently 12GW of installed renewable capacity.
