China’s Silk Road Fund to invest in Dubai solar project

China’s Silk Road Fund Company is investing in the world’s largest solar thermal plant that is under development in Dubai, an executive at the company promoting the project said.

The project is being built by Riyadh-based Acwa Power International and Shanghai Electric Group.

It is expected to cost $3.9 billion (Dh14.33bn) to build and is planned to have a capacity of 700 megawatts, which is about half of what a nuclear reactor is capable of producing. Silk Road officials were not immediately available for comment.

“They are investing, as one of the shareholders in one of the CSP projects in Dubai,” said Thamer Al Sharhan, managing director at Acwa.

The financing gives credibility to Acwa’s ambitions to build one of the world’s leading solar power plants at what was a record low cost when the project won a contract to supply electricity last year.

Acwa won a tender for the project with a bid to sell power at 7.3 cents a kilowatt-hour, which at the time was a record low for solar. It’s expected to be commissioned in several stages starting with the fourth quarter of 2020.

CSP is short for concentrated solar project, a type of thermal plant where the sun’s rays are focused on heating a fluid that can be used to turn power turbines. It’s a technology capable of producing power after dark because the fluid retains much of its heat for hours after the sun sets. That is a contrast with photovoltaics, which needs the sun to charge.