Mitsui & Co., a leading Japanese trading company, announced on October 1, 2007, that it won a contract with Egypt's National Renewable Energies Authority to construct a new hybrid solar-thermal and gas-fired plant in Egypt with yen loan financing. As part of a consortium with a Spanish engineering and construction company, Iberdrola Ingenieria, the company will deliver the gas combined-cycle system of the plant under a lump sum and full turnkey contract to include design, material procurement, construction, installation, and after-startup adjustment.

The plant will be the world's first power-generating system utilizing thermal energy generated by solar thermal collectors as a supplementary energy source for the existing gas combined cycle plant, and will have 150 megawatts (MW) of power generation capacity. It will be constructed in Kuraymat, about 100 kilometers south of Cairo, at a cost of 23 billion yen (about U.S.$198 million) within 30 months of the contract coming into effect.

Electricity demand in Egypt is growing by seven percent a year, and the country is trying to increase the capacity of its power generation facilities. The Egyptian government plans to produce 880 MW of electricity from renewable sources such as hydropower, solar thermal, and wind energy to reduce the country's environmental impact, an amount equivalent to three percent of the total increased generation capacity planned by 2011.

http://www.mitsui.co.jp/en/index.html

Posted: 2008/02/23 12:29:31 PM
Japanese version

TAG Energy , Global warming , Government , Non-manufacturing industry