UAE's Masdar, EDF Energies lead bidders for Saudi solar plant

Abu Dhabi Future Energy Co. (Masdar) and French partner EDF Energies Nouvelles have submitted the lowest joint bid at 1.79 US cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) to build Saudi Arabia’s 300 megawatt solar PV project in Sakaka, the Kingdom’s energy ministry said.

Saudi power-plant developer ACWA Power made the second-lowest bid at 2.34 cents kWh, while a group led by Marubeni Corp. came in the third place.

"All of the bids opened on Tuesday will now undergo stringent technical, financial and legal evaluation," Turki Al-Shehri, the head of the Energy Ministry's Renewable Energy Project Development Office (REPDO) told Reuters in a statement.

Bidders for the Sakaka solar energy project will be shortlisted on November 28, and bids will be evaluated by January 27.

In April, the Kingdom kicked off the massive renewable program in Riyadh by announcing the beginning of the bidding process for Sakaka, which is expected to launch operations by 2018-2019, Argaam earlier reported.