The first private photovoltaic 100 MW capacity plant with is being launched in the Karmana district of the Navoi province. During his visit to the province, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev took part in the launching ceremony, press secretary of the head of state Sherzod Asadov said.
The President noted that the facility, which was built in a year and a half, was the first step in the transition to "green energy". He pointed out that within the framework of the project, 110 million dollars of investment were disbursed and with 300 thousand solar panels installed.
“252 million kWh of electricity will be produced here a year. Due to this, 80 million cubic meters of gas will be saved and the release of 160 thousand tons of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere will be prevented,” Shavkat Mirziyoyev said.
He called the solar power plant "the first sign" in the energy system of New Uzbekistan, which "should start an absolutely new era in the development of the industry."
“As you know, our country has an average of 320 sunny days per year. It is not for nothing that our country is called "sunny Uzbekistan". But until now, the issue of using this enormous potential has remained outside our attention. According to experts, through the construction of solar power plants, Uzbekistan has the ability to generate 600 billion kWh of electricity. This is eight times more than the need that the republic has today,” the president said.
He said that it is planned to increase the capacity of solar power plants to 5,000 MW by 2030, and to 3,000 MW of wind power plants.
For this, he said, another solar power plant with a capacity of 100 MW will be launched in Samarkand by the end of the year. In the next two years, nine solar power plants with a total capacity of 2,100 MW will appear in Bukhara, Jizzak, Namangan, Samarkand, Khorezm, Surkhandarya and Kashkadarya, and four wind power plants with a capacity of 1,600 MW in Karakalpakstan, Bukhara and Navoi.
“We have started fundamental reforms in the energy sector. Instead of a monopoly state company for the production, transmission, distribution and sale of electricity, four independent companies are organized. As the main tasks, we have identified the formation of a competitive wholesale market in the energy sector, creating ample opportunities for private investors and meeting in this way the growing demand for electricity at affordable prices, ”Shavkat Mirziyoyev said.
He added that by 2025 all conditions will be created for private investors to produce up to 50% of the country's electricity.
Continuing his speech, the President stressed that the solar power plant in Navoi is the first such facility built by a private investor - Masdar from the United Arab Emirates. Today the project is the largest among those implemented in partnership with foreign companies.
In addition, work has begun with the UAE on six more projects with a total cost of US$ 1.5 billion and a capacity of 1,700 MW. In particular, a 500 MW wind power plant will be built in Navoi province together with Masdar, and a 200 MW solar power plant will be built with Phanes Group.
Arab Masdar won the tender for the construction of a photovoltaic plant in October 2019. As part of the PPP agreement, the company committed itself to supplying the state with electricity for 25 years at a price of 2.679 cents per kilowatt-hour. In the future, the station will be operated by the Nur Navoi Solar project company.
The general contractor of the project was the Chinese "Sepko III"
