US energy giant First Solar on Tuesday won a deal with China to build the world’s largest solar power plant in the Mongolian desert, which officials say could mitigate climate change concerns.
First Solar will construct the 2 gigawatt plant in Ordos City, Inner Mongolia, under a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed on Tuesday with Chinese officials at the company’s headquarters in Tempe, Arizona.
The solar facility is to be built in four phases over a decade and supply power to 3 million Chinese homes, the company said in a statement.
“We’re proud to be announcing this precedent-setting project today,” First Solar chief executive Mike Ahearn said in the statement.
The US and China, he said, could work together to reduce the cost of solar electricity to “grid parity” — where it is competitive with traditional energy sources — and “create the blueprint for accelerated mass-scale deployment of solar power worldwide to mitigate climate change.”
The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed but First Solar said that if a similar plant were to be built in the US, the cost would be between US$5 billion and US$6 billion.
“In China, due to lower labor costs and other factors, we expect the plant cost would likely be lower,” First Solar spokeswoman Lisa Morse said.
“We are not speculating on what the actual cost of a plant might be in China since details of the project still have to be determined,” she said.
China’s chief legislator, Wu Bangguo (吳邦國), the second-most powerful leader in the Chinese Communist Party after President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤), witnessed the signing of the MOU.
Wu is expected to meet with US congressional leaders and officials in US President Barack Obama’s administration in Washington on a variety of energy, trade and business initiatives.
Wu and other Chinese officials discussed with First Solar executives the “significant potential” for the two nations to address global climate change through markets that took advantage of their solar resources, the US company said.
The MOU outlined a long-term “strategic partnership” between First Solar and Ordos City, where the US firm could consider establishing a solar panel manufacturing investment.
China has expressed plans to provide 10 percent of its energy from renewable resources by 2010 and 15 percent by 2020, including from wind, hydro, biomass and solar. Various state incentives are being introduced for such growth.
While current Chinese solar installations total about 90 megawatts, Beijing has boosted its previous solar capacity goal of 1.8 gigawatts by 2020 to two gigawatts by 2011, and between 10 gigawatts and 20 gigawatts by 2020, a statement issued in conjunction with the MOU signing said.
The first phase of the Ordos solar power plant will be a 30 megawatt “demonstration” project that will see construction begin by June 1 next year, officials said.
The second and third phases will be 100 megawatt and 870 megawatt projects, expected to be completed by the end of 2014, while the fourth phase will be a 1,000 megawatt facility tipped to be completed by end 2019.
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS