Moroccan wind farm tender continues at slow pace

12 May 2010

Morocco aims to generate 42 per cent of power needs with renewable resources

Morocco’s Office National de l’Electricite (ONE) is still yet to open the tariff pricing on bids to build the planned 300MW Tarfaya wind farm.

France’s GDF-Suez and the UK’s International Power with the local Nareva Holding submitted bids in July 2009 to build the project.

Bids were entered in three separate envelopes containing the technical, financial and tariff elements of each submission.  

The tariff opening was scheduled for the end of March, but was postponed and is still yet to occur.

The tender process has experienced many delays since bids were first invited in February 2008.

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) and European Investment Bank (EIB) are expected to put forward a significant portion of the finance for the project.

ONE’s advisory team is made up of the US’s Chadbourne & Parke for legal, the UK’s HSBC for financial and Garrad Hassan for technical.

International Power’s bid is advised by the UK’s Clifford Chance while France’s GDF-Suez has appointed the US’s Vinson & Elkins, and Shearman & Sterling to act for its lenders.

Morocco has initiated an ambitious strategy to boost the share of renewable energies in the kingdom’s power sector to satisfy increasing domestic demand.

The target is to develop 2,000MW wind, 2,000MW hydroelectric and 2,000MW solar installed capacity by 2020, which is expected to represent 42 per cent of the total power generation capacity.

A solar project originally led by ONE has recently been passed to the newly created Moroccan Agency for Solar Energy (Masen). The solar project will have a capacity of 500MW when complete.

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