In line with Abu Dhabi’s goal to reach 7 percent renewable energy power generation capacity within the next 10 years, Masdar Abu Dhabi has partnered with the bid consortium of Total S.A., the French petroleum goliath, and Abengoa Solar, a Spanish multinational corporation specializing in sustainable energy development.

Together, Masdar, Total and Abengoa Solar will build, own and operate Shams 1, which will be the largest concentrated solar power plant in the world.
Masdar is best known as the creator of Masdar City, a cluster of clean tech buildings on the outskirts of Abu Dhabi, which will run entirely on renewable energy when finished. The state-owned energy company recently won the Zayed Future Energy Prize in 2009 for “…excellence in the innovation, development and implementation of sustainable energy solutions,” according to the Masdar website.

The Shams 1 solar power plant will be located 120 kilometers southwest of Abu Dhabi, in the city of Madinat Zayed. The 100 megawatt capacity will require a 2.5 square kilometer (about one square mile) area and a solar field consisting of 768 parabolic trough collectors. These collectors will be provided by Abengoa Solar.

Not only will the facility generate 100 megawatts of electricity, but it will prevent the city from producing an estimated 170 thousand tons of carbon dioxide annually.

Construction is set to begin by the last quarter of 2010 and in two years, Shams 1 will not only be the largest concentrated solar power plant in the world but also the first of its kind in the Middle East. The estimated cost of the project is about 600 million dollars.

The power plant will be a solar thermal power plant and will use mirrors to heat a liquid substance, converting it to steam, which will cause turbines to power a generator. The steam will then be recycled back into the system as liquid.

Despite ambitions of having the largest solar power plant ever built, this would still only make up a fraction of the electric energy consumed by the world. The race against global warming begins with many small steps such as these.

View a previously written post by Mouli Cohen about Clean Energy.