Lots of exciting solar industry news has been filtering out of the Middle East this year, with Jordan often at the heart of the proceedings. The country has put a smile on solar developer faces once again today, with the announcement of a new round of tendering for a further 200 MW of utility-scale solar to be developed in the country.
The government announcement, calling for developers, joint ventures or consortiums to apply for participation in the third round of solar PV tenders within the country, came at the Solar Energy Trade Mission currently taking place in Amman. The event is being organized by the Middle East Solar Industry Association (MESIA), who has been helping facilitate solar development right across the continent.
The new tender will be for the development of 200 MW of PV, believed to be spread across various projects in the Ma’an region of the country. “The tender will be for four PV projects of 50 MW each,” MESIA President Hadi Tahboub confirmed with pv magazine. “The tender will be available to enter after today, and the winning entries will be awarded after the winners of the Green Corridor Project have been decided.”
As the announcement has only just been made, it is unclear who plans to enter bids into the tender, and at what price, however, Tahboub said that he had seen lots of interest from international developers during the event. With incredibly low prices being bid for solar across the Middle East over the last year, it will be interesting to see how these bids compare.
Interestingly, the Public Security Directorate (PSD) also took the opportunity to announces plans to tender its own solar projects. These are to be fitted across PSD facilities in Jordan, and will have a combined capacity of 60 MW.
“There is a lot of desire from government departments to tender the schemes themselves, without going through the usual red tape,” added Tahboub. “There will be up to 60 MW of PV tendered to be installed on the government departments, but we are just waiting to have clarification about the details of the tender scheme.”
