Morocco built the world's largest solar power plant

Morocco will become a superpower of renewable energy when the world's largest concentrated solar power plant comes into operation.

Morocco builds solar power plant

According to the IB Times, the Noor factory is located in Ouarzazate, which is dubbed the Door to the Desert , the provincial capital of the same name in central Morocco. The plant is part of a plan to bring Morocco into a country that uses half of its electricity from renewable energy after five years.

Noor (in Arabic means light) is a combination of 4 solar power plants with large capacity, worth 9 billion USD. Factory No. 1 has 500,000 sunlight-collecting mirrors, which are arranged in 800 rows, with a capacity of 160 MW of electricity a year, which will go into operation next month.

Noor factory No. 1 will go into operation next month.(Photo: Guardian).

Each parabolic mirror 12 meters high, connected by a steel pipe system acts as a "heat transfer solution (HFT) hot to 393 degrees Celsius to a heat engine. There, it will be mixed with water to form steam that drives turbines to generate electricity.

Factory No. 2 and No. 3 are expected to come into operation in 2017, factory No. 4 is expected to be 2020. At that time, the total area of ​​solar mirrors installed in Noor is estimated by the area of ​​Rabat capital (117km ^2). ) of Morocco, and is the world's largest solar PV (CSP) plant with a capacity of 580 MW a year, enough to supply one million households. The largest photovoltaic plant today is Solar Star located at Rosamond, California, USA, with a capacity of 579 MW a year.

The Moroccan Environment Minister, Hakima el-Haite, said solar would have a similar impact on the region, such as oil exploitation and production.

"We are not the oil producer. 94% of the electricity that Morocco uses comes from fossil fuels and must be imported from abroad, which is a huge burden for the budget , " said el-Haite. Therefore, the Moroccan government decided to invest in potential solar energy.

12-meter parabolic mirrors placed in the No. 1 factory in the Sahara Desert.(Photo: Guardian).

Solar energy will become Morocco's third source of renewable energy by 2020, along with wind power and hydropower.

"We are very proud of this project," said el-Haite. "I appreciate this is a very important solar power plant in the world". The Moroccan government hopes that in the future, it will be possible to export solar energy to regional and European countries.