The plants will be based on a technology introduced in Spain, whose energy storage system works for up to 15 hours without sunlight.
As of next year the Spanish company Sener will build two solar plants in Abu Dhabi (United Arab Emirates) for a total investment of $600 million (about €460 million). To carry out this project, the company will work together with its partners in this emirate. Sener has a joint venture company there called Torresol Energy, which includes its local partner Masdar, that develops renewable energy projects in Abu Dhabi.
Torresol Energy is currently building a plant in Seville (Spain) that will be the first in the world using a technology based on the concentration of light from the mirrors of a central power tower, to which is added a storage system of molten salt. Its innovation stems from the fact that the system can function for 15 hours without sunlight, which allows it to transfer energy at night or when it’s cloudy; this is in contrast to normal solar plants whose storage only lasts for seven hours. The plant in Seville will be able to produce about 16 megawatts (equivalent to eight large windmills, or the consumption of a town with 25,000 residents).
The new technology used in Seville serves as a pilot project for the two plants in Abu Dhabi, which will be presented at the end of the year and whose construction will begin next year. The two plants in Abu Dhabi will have a larger capacity of 50 megawatts each.
Sener has announced that in forthcoming years it will put in place another three or four solar energy projects of a similar nature in Spain, together with its partners from Abu Dhabi.
In other fields, the Spanish firm is carrying out a study toward the possible implementation of a streetcar in Abu Dhabi, which is being developed as part of a consortium with Typsa, another Spanish engineering company.