A 100 MW solar and storage plant in South Africa has generated its first power to the national grid.
The milestone means that construction of the Kathu Solar Park by Spanish companies SENER and ACCIONA Industrial has taken a major step towards conclusion.
Kathu is equipped with a molten salt storage system that will allow it to keep producing electricity for almost five hours after the sun has gone down. It generates electricity via parabolic trough technology designed by SENER.
Siyabonga Mbanjwa, SENER’s Southern Africa managing director, said that the plant will be operational “in the next couple of months”.
He said once operational, the plant “will provide clean energy to the local community of the John Taole District Municipality, the Northern Cape Province and South Africa as a whole”.
Francisco García Bueno, project director at ACCIONA Industrial, said the plant’s synchronisation “is one of the most important final milestones that will enable us to complete a process that began in 2016”.
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