This is a contribution to the achievement of the first stage of the solar thermal power plant in the El Borma region, Tunisia’s far south.
Japan decided to grant Tunisia a donation worth 3 billion yens (about 50 million dinars) and will provide Japanese developed technology in the field of power production through solar energy, a Japanese official said.
This is a contribution to the achievement of the first stage of the solar thermal power plant in the El Borma region, Tunisia’s far south.
Mr. Yoshinao Ogawa, Director of the International Business Bureau, Department of Energy and Renewable Energies in the Energy and Natural Resources Agency in Japan’s Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry, said that the Japanese New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO), very active in the field of renewable energies and industrial technologies, will create a Concentrating Solar Power of a 5-MW power.
The CSP, whose construction cost is estimated at 55 billion dinars according to preliminary studies, is one of the components of a combined-cycle plant whose total capacity is of 40 MW.
The Japanese official said, in a news conference held Wednesday in Tunis, that the Concentrating Solar Power will be the first "milestone of the Tunisian solar plan." This power plant, which will generate between 500 and 1,000 jobs, will come into operation in the second quarter of 2013.
He also underlined that Japanese technology to be adopted in the construction of the CSP will not only help produce solar energy but will also be used in other fields such as water desalination.
Studies related to the project, he said, started in 2010. Yet, a delay was recorded during the Tunisian Revolution and the recent quake in Japan.
He said after talks held on Wednesday with Minister of Industry and Technology Abdelaziz Rassaa that it had been agreed to speed technical aspects of the project.
Tunisia and Japan had signed a Memorandum of Understanding on the construction of the Concentrating Solar Power as part of the second Arab-Japanese Economic Forum.
