Solar electricity has fallen in price by 50% in the last 16 months

2.99 cents per kWh

The Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) announced tender proposals for the construction of the third phase of the Mohammed Bin Rashid al-Maktoum solar power plant for 800 MW.

Total received five proposals from foreign organizations. After opening the envelopes, the minimum price for the supply of electricity was $ 0.0299 per kilowatt-hour, that is, 2.99 cents per kWh . For comparison, in the US, industrial-scale solar power plants supply electricity, on average, at a price of 5 cents per kWh , using government subsidies and tax breaks. There are no subsidies and benefits.

2.99 cents per kWh can be considered a new record. This is the lowest price of clean energy recorded today. But the record is unlikely to last long. At tenders in 2015 and 2016 in the United States and other countries, a tendency to a sharp decline in prices. Over the past 16 months, the cost of electricity in the same Dubai has almost doubled .
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In January 2015, the UAE authorities signed a 25-year contract for the purchase of solar electricity at a fixed price of $ 0.0584 per kWh. At that time, it was the lowest cost in the world.

But in the summer of 2015, the city administration of Austin (Texas) received proposals for the construction of stations of nearly 1,300 MW with an electricity tariff of less than $ 0.04 / kWh (with subsidies). Shortly thereafter, it became known that the energy company NV Energy had agreed to buy electricity from the 100-megawatt First Solar station for $ 0.0387 / kWh .

In the end, in April 2016, Enel Green entered into contracts for $ 0.036 / kWh in Mexico and $ 0.03 / kWh in Morocco .

And now we have the figure of $ 0.0299 / kWh in Dubai. True, there the contract has not yet been signed.

Nevertheless, it can be concluded that in 16 months the cost of solar electricity fell by almost half! So rapid progress of alternative energy is very surprising.



Of course, we are talking about the minimum cost for large industrial installations in solar countries. But the average cost of solar electricity in other countries is also declining at about the same rate , although in Russia or Germany it will be obviously higher than in the UAE or Saudi Arabia. Nevertheless, in a few years or decades even the cost of solar energy will inevitably fall to 2-3 cents per kWh.



The expert committee in Dubai will now examine the technical and commercial details of each proposal. According to rumors , a consortium of companies Abdul Latif Jameel (Saudi Arabia) + Fotowatio Renewable Ventures (Spain) + Masdar (United Arab Emirates) offered the lowest price of 2.99 cents per kWh. The second place with the price of 3.65 cents per kWh was taken by JinkoSolar (China), the third place with the price of 3.95 cents - a consortium of companies Acwa Power and First Solar (USA). Dubai authorities plan that Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum’s solar power plant with a total capacity of 3 gigawatts will be built by 2030, with an estimated investment of $ 3 billion.