Egypt, UAE seal major onshore wind farm deal at COP27

The UAE and Egypt have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to develop one of the world’s largest onshore wind projects in Egypt, as Cairo continues to build out its renewable energy capacity in pursuit of its ambition to become a regional power hub in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Sultan al-Jaber, chairman of UAE renewable energy company Masdar, signed an agreement for the Masdar Infinity Power joint venture with Egyptian renewable energy developer Infinity and Hassan Allam Utilities, the Emirates National News Agency reported. Wan.

The signing ceremony took place on Nov. 8 during COP27 in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh in the presence of both presidents.

Al-Jaber is the UAE’s climate envoy, minister of industry and group chief executive of national energy company ADNOC.

Masdar’s chief executive, Mohamed Jameel al-Ramahi, called the deal “our biggest project to date”. Masdar’s current renewable energy portfolio is valued at $20 billion, with over 15 GW of power capacity.

The 10 GW farm is expected to produce 47,790 GWh of clean energy annually and offset 23.8 million tons of CO2 emissions₂ emissions, equivalent to around 9% of Egypt’s current CO2 emissions₂ emission.

“The UAE and Masdar will continue to support Egypt’s net-zero emission goals, and as the UAE prepares to host COP28 next year, we will work to build on the results achieved at COP27,” al-Jaber said in the statement. WAM.

When completed, the wind farm will form part of Egypt’s Green Corridor initiative, an electrical grid dedicated to renewable energy projects that aims to ensure that renewables account for 42 percent of the country’s energy mix by 2035.

The wind project is expected to save Egypt about $5 billion a year in natural gas costs. Egypt’s total installed capacity in 2019/2020 is approximately 59.5 GW, Wan The country’s renewable energy authority was quoted as saying.

green hydrogen in the wind

In April, Masdar and Hassan Allam Utilities signed two memorandums of understanding with Egyptian state-backed organizations to collaborate on the development of 4 GW of green hydrogen plants in the Suez Canal Economic Zone and along the Mediterranean coast.

According to Masdar, the first phase calls for the development of a green hydrogen production facility to be operational by 2026 with an annual capacity of 100,000 tonnes of e-methanol for refueling the Suez Canal. E-menthol is produced by combining bio-sourced CO₂ Hydrogen gas produced by electrolysis of water.

The electrolyser facility could be expanded to 4 GW by 2030 to produce 2.3 million tonnes of green ammonia for export and locally supply green hydrogen for industrial use.

Meanwhile, Egypt’s Infinity Group is poised to become Africa’s largest renewable energy company itself after announcing in July that it had partnered with the African Finance Corporation to acquire Lekela Power, Africa’s largest independent power producer.

Lekela has a portfolio of wind power projects in Egypt, Senegal and South Africa and is developing a portfolio of projects across the African continent. Infinity said it expects the deal to close by the end of 2022.

Meanwhile, in October 2021, Egypt reached an agreement with Greece to create an EU-backed EuroAfrica Interconnector, a submarine cable Transporting renewable energy from North Africa to Europe via Cyprus. In the same month, Egypt also signed a contract with Saudi Arabia to establish links with Saudi Arabia.

Cairo has built interconnectors with Jordan (250 MW capacity, expected to grow to 450-500 MW); Sudan (80 MW capacity expected to grow to 300 MW); (ITA) National Survey for Egypt, Libya (200 MW) Updated August 2022.

Egypt has set a goal of increasing renewable energy generation to 20% by 2022 and 42% by 2035, of which wind energy accounts for 14%, hydropower accounts for 1.98%, photovoltaics accounts for 21.3%, wind energy accounts for 14%. Light solar energy accounts for 5.52%, according to ITA report, by 2035, traditional energy will account for 57.33%.

But a revised plan reviewed by the government in August could lead to more aggressive targets to push the share of renewables in Egypt’s energy mix to 33 percent by 2025, 48 percent by 2030 and 20 percent by 2035. 55%, reaching 61% by 2040, with the private sector providing most of the capacity, according to US government research.