Total and Abengoa to sign UAE solar farm deal

The United Arab Emirates is set to sign a deal on Wednesday with Total, the French energy group, and Abengoa Solar, the Spanish company, to build the world’s largest concentrating solar power plant.

The $600m Shams plant, located 120km south west of Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, will produce 100MW of energy – 10 times more than an existing solar park built by Enviromena Power Systems at the Gulf country’s ambitious Masdar alternative energy initiative.

For Total, the plant will be the manifestation of the company’s increasing presence in solar energy, an alternative fuel in which competitors such as BP and Shell have reduced their interest in favour of developing second generation biofuels, which produce more energy and have a less detrimental effect on food production than corn ethanol and other biofuels currently on the market.