Egypt, UAE presidents attend signing of MoU on 10-GW wind farm's monitoring systems

CAIRO – 8 November 2022: President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan attended, on the sidelines COP 27, the signing of an MoU on establishing the monitoring systems of a wind farm, whose capacity is 10 GW.

In July, Egypt's Ministry of Electricity and Renewable Energy, and UAE's Masdar and ADNOC signed an agreement to build the farm.

Similarly, Egypt and Saudi Arabia signed early in November an MoU to build a 10-GW wind farm, whose cost $1.5 billion.

The document was signed by Egypt’s New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA), the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company, and Saudi Arabia's ACWA Power Company.

Germany's Siemens for Renewable Energy announced in December the operation of the wind farm in West Bakr area in Ras Ghareb in the Gulf of Suez with a capacity of 250 megawatts.

The company stated that the project was implemented by Siemens Gamesa, a leading renewable energy company in the world. The company had successfully installed 96 wind turbines (SG 2.6-114) for Lekela company to generate renewable energy through an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract.

The statement indicated that Siemens would provide a long-term maintenance service through a 15-year service agreement. The West Bakr wind farm is now operating at full capacity under the management of Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company and the New and Renewable Energy Authority.

The project represents the first renewable energy project in Egypt to be activated through a 220-kV insulated gas substation.

The farm comes within Egypt's plan to make the share of renewables in the energy mix 42 percent by 2035. It would also prevent more than 550,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually.