Renewable energy: a 12.24 MW solar farm in the making in Queen Victoria
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"Mauritius being a tropical country, it has a great potential to capture solar energy to generate electricity," says the developer. For Voltas Green Ltd, a company incorporated on 6 April 2016, the country, which is largely dependent on fossil energy, must reduce its dependence on this type of energy for several reasons. The company points out that the government wants to increase the contribution of renewable energy to electricity production to 35% by 2025.
Sarwar Joonas, director of Voltas Green Ltd, sees the potential of solar energy and proposes this project. The company has entered into an agreement with the Central Electricity Board (CEB) to purchase the electricity it will generate. The Power Purchasing Agreement was signed on 16 December last.
On 15 October 2015, the CEB issued a Request for Proposals to select a company to develop a solar farm in Mauritius. A proposal was submitted by Voltas Eco-Biotech Ltd, established in 2014, of which Voltas Green Ltd is a sister company. Voltas
Eco-Biotech Ltd will be selected as the sole applicant.
The site chosen for the construction of the solar farm covers 171,263 m2. It was chosen for several reasons. Amongst them: the geographical position in relation to the level of sunlight and the proximity to a BEC substation. An agreement was reached with the owners of the land, which was under sugarcane cultivation. A 22-year lease agreement was drawn up.
In its application for an Environmental Impact Assessment licence, the developer points out, with figures, that Mauritius has the ideal conditions for a solar park. These figures indicate that the country enjoys, on average, 2 900 hours of sunshine per year. In other words, out of 365 days in a year, the sun would shine for 121 days.
"The minimum number of hours of sunlight per day is six hours, and this can rise to 7.3 hours. This means that under ideal conditions, the solar park should produce exportable energy to the grid for at least six hours a day."
In 2015, the share of photovoltaic energy in Mauritius was 0.14%. This is still a long way from the 35% that the government wants to achieve within eight years.
