Noor Abu Dhabi Solar PV Plant

Abu Dhabi

The Noor Abu Dhabi IPP is currently the largest single-site solar project in the world, with 1.2 GW of capacity. Its construction started in May 2017, undertaken by EPC contractor Sterling and Wilson. After a USD 871-million investment, the project started operations in April 2019.

The project was developed under a build-own-operate basis by the special purpose company Sweihan PV Power Company, composed of AD Power (60%), Marubeni (20%) and Jinko Solar (20%) Jinko Solar provided highly efficient monochrystalline PV modules placed on a fixed-tilt supporting structure designed using an inventive module layout. The electricity offtaker is Emirates Water and Electricity Company, via a 25-year power purchase agreement.

Key facts:

• Installed capacity: 1.2 GW
• PV design: East-west orientation
• Solar cell architecture: MONO PERC technology (passivated emitter and rear cell)
• Area: 8 square kilometres
• Number of solar panels: 3.4 million
• Direct current capacity: 1.2 GW
• Tariff: USD 0.0242 per kWh
• Carbon footprint equivalent to removing 200,000 cars from Abu Dhabi streets.

The plant has a unique solar PV design, according to Abdulla Al Kayoumi, CEO of Sweihan PV Power Company. “We’re using east-west orientation for the modules, which is not commonly seen in solar plants,” he told The Energy Year. “The good thing about this design is that it distributes the production more evenly throughout the day – this means not just producing peak production at solar noon but more on the ‘shoulders’ of the production curve. It also takes advantage of energy time-of-day pricing opportunities with offtakers where applicable.”

Construction achievements:

• World-record fastest construction of a PV plant: 20 months
• Peak PV module installation in one day: 26,000 modules
• Amount of capacity installed in one month: 200 MW

Cleaning robotics:

• Number of cleaning robots: 1,400
• System: dry cleaning
• Daily wipes: twice per day

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