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meeco enters clean energy market in Saudi Arabia with new local partnership

Asia, Clean Energy, Common, Projects, Sustainability, Technical Solutions

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July 2, 2018

3:44 pm

sun2roof solar equipment shipped to Khobar City to be installed on three roofs

With up to 2,800 kWh/m2 per year Saudi Arabia has one of the highest solar radiations worldwide. Recognising the tremendous potential of solar energy in Saudi Arabia, we have entered into negotiations with Saudi Arabian entrepreneurs several years ago. Nationally subsidised power prices and the huge oil reserves in the country though have limited the incentive to invest into clean energy solutions such as photovoltaic until yet.

But since the Electricity and Cogeneration Regulatory Authority (ECRA) has announced a threefold increase in the electricity tariff in January 2018, the tide is turning. The increased monthly electricity bill will solidify the business case for especially small to medium-scale solar energy projects. Due to the price decline of solar energy technologies together with a continuous efficiency improvement of these the return of investment for a small-scale solar energy project will now lessen from 10 – 15 years to 5 – 7 years.

In Saudi Arabia prevail perfect conditions for renewable energy systems.

New partner and commercial projects

Thanks to this solar energy friendly developments, we were now able to find a strong renewable energy partner in Saudi Arabia: Energy Systems. In the scope of a joint venture, we will henceforth develop small to medium-scale PV projects together with Energy Systems following the market strategy of delivering commercial customers with solar power turnkey solutions. The first three solar energy projects will be realised in Bisha city in the southwest of Saudi Arabia and in Al Khobar, in the eastern part of the Kingdom. meeco and Energy Systems to install sun2roof monocrystalline solar energy solutions on the roof of three buildings.

Use Cases for solar on/off-grid and roof installations

“Saudi Arabia represents a promising market for the commercial exploitation of solar energy”, states Konstantin Wolf, CFO of meeco. “Especially commercial energy consumers such as agricultural enterprises, cement factories or large industrial companies can benefit from an independent, reliable and eco-friendly power supply with on/off-grid solar installations. But also, public building such as schools, ministries or shopping malls are perfectly suitable for solar installations, since the peaks of energy demand correspond with the efficiency peaks of the PV installations, i.e. the solar energy will be directly consumed when produced.”

Air conditioning units, still today mainly operated by diesel, are part of the biggest energy consuming units in Saudi Arabia. “Due to decreasing equipment prices and the low maintenance costs solar energy systems can offer a cheaper and greener energy supply with low maintenance costs”, explains Saeed Balhaddad, CEO of Energy Systems. “We are looking forward to further accelerate the deployment of renewable energy across Saudi Arabia.”