SolarReserve and ACWA Power officially announce their 100 MW CSP tower plant in South Africa
The 100 MW Redstone Solar Thermal Power Project in South Africa, owned by a SolarReserve led consortium with ACWA Power, has been nominated ‘preferred bidder’ by the Department of Energy (DOE).
The Redstone Solar Thermal Power project was awarded preferred bidder in round 3.5 of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement (REIPPP), with the lowest tariff bid to date from any CSP project in the country.
“The Redstone Solar Project is another successful bid where we challenged ourselves to deliver the lowest tariff to date in the REIPPP programme for electricity generated wholly with solar power but dispatchable reliably both at day and night,” said Paddy Padmanathan, President and CEO of ACWA Power.
The project technology will be based on SolarReserve's Crescent Dunes project in the US, which is currently in final commissioning. Redstone Solar is scheduled to achieve financial close later this year and start operations in early 2018. The other winner was the consortium led by GDF Suez. Both preferred bidders will be invited to enter into a 20-year Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Eskom.
SolarReserve, ACWA Power, GDF Suez and Eskom amongst others, will be speaking about project development and the next steps for the CSP industry in the region at the CSP Today South Africa 2015 conference (14-15 April, Cape Town). Find out more here: http://goo.gl/hNgI22