How Morocco’s Noor Project can power the World and put light on Africa's Electricity Problem

Morocco is the gateway to Africa and the location of sites for the filming of such movies as “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Gladiator” and the TV series “Game of Thrones”.

But in 2020, Morocco is set to turn on the world's largest Solar Power Plant in the world by 2020 called the Noor 1 as reported in the article “Morocco to build world's largest concentrated Solar power plant”, published November 3, 2015  By Milena Veselinovic, CNN News.

The Noor 1 complex, which will start generating some 160 Megawatts of power in November 2015,  is set to supply electricity to 1.1 million Moroccans by 2018 as reported in the article “Morocco to host world’s largest solar power plant by 2020”, published October 27 2015 by Darwin Malicdem, International Business Times. 

It’s located on a 30 square kilometer patch outside the city of Ouarzazate, on the fringe of the Sahara desert. The Noor Project was launched by Morocco's King Mohammed VI in 2013 and is intended to reduce carbon emissions by 700,000 tons per year, allowing Morocco to export surplus electricity when fully constructed by 2020.

King Mohammed VI and Noor Project – How US$9 billion will help Morocco go Carbon-Neutral

King Mohammed VI has made it so that the cost of the Noor is being paid for by US$9 billion in investments from international financial institutions such as the World Bank. Subsidies have also been put in place so that the cost of constructing the world's largest Solar power plant isn't being transferred to the people of Morocco.

The use of Solar power is a very future-forward move by this African nation that imports 97% of its fuel. They already have the Turfaya wind farm which is the largest on the continent with 131 turbines. This is making Morocco attractive to investors in renewable Energy and has already garnered a favourable rating from investment firm Ernst and Young.

By installing the Noor Solar Power Plant, Morocco hopes to stabilize their electricity supply for the tens of thousands of Morocco's rural poor and in the process, meet their target of 42% of their Energy coming from carbon-neutral sources, with 14% from Solar power by 2020.

So how does the Noor Solar Power Plant work?

Morocco’s Noor Project, the World’s Largest Solar Power Plant - How Noor can power the World and puts light on Africa's Electricity Problem

Since the establishment of the Moroccan Agency for Solar Energy in 2010, Morocco has been spearheading investment in renewable Energy in a bid to diversify away from the importation fossil fuels to provide their domestic Energy needs.

Lack of reliable electricity has been blamed for Africa's slow developement, as both the infrastructure as well as cheap and reliable electricity is needed to jumpstart the developement of the country set to become the most populous by 2050 as noted in my blog article entitled “United Nations Population Division says 11.2 billion people by 2100 - Why Africa and India Population exploding as Insect Meat is coming”.

The word ‘Noor” means ‘light” in Arabic and the Noor project is made up of four (4) phases to build out the Solar Power plant as reported in the article “Morocco is building the largest Solar power plat the world has ever seen”, published October 28, 2015 By Chloe Olewitz, DigitalTrends. 

However, unlike a traditional Photovoltaic plant, the Noor is a CSP (Concentrating Solar Power). This design works by using mirrors to focus sunlight unto a large tower with a specially designed synthetic thermal oil solution that will reach temperatures of 400 degrees Celsius. The heated liquid is them run through a heat exchanger to heat water which will turn a steam turbine which in turns generates electricity.

The first phase, Noor 1, involves the installing of 500,000 mirrors, each measuring 12 meter high in 800 rows to track the sun as it passes across the desert sky each day. Noor 2 and Noor 3 are basically an expansion on this initial plant and will be completed by 2017.

When the plant is finally completed by 2020, the plant will be the size of Morocco’s capital city of Rabat. Noor 1 will generate some 580 Megawatts of electricity, enough Energy to power an estimated 1 million Moroccan homes.

Noor 2, Noor 3 and Noor 4 will also add specialized heat tanks filled with molten sands in to store Solar Energy for up to eight hours after the sun has set as noted in the article “Morocco will launch Africa's biggest solar farm”, published 27 Oct 2015 By Madhumita Murgia, The UK Telegraph. Morocco and even neighboring nations will be able to run 24/7 on Solar Energy!

King Mohammed VI Mecca Ambitions – How Noor can power the World using Undersea Power Cables

King Mohammed VI, however, is more ambitions than that. He has his long term vision of being able to sell electricity as far away as Mecca in Saudi Arabia.

Potentially, this plant might even be able to supply all of Europe and the entire world with electricity as well, if expanded and Undersea Power Cables were run as specified in my blog article entitled “High Noon on the Rhine as Germany produces 50% Electricity by Solar – How Solar Power in Africa and Undersea Power Cables can Power the World”. 

Thus King Mohammed VI ambitions are not far-fetched, but modest. There is enough space in the desert to not only power Mecca but the whole world, which is quite fitting, being as Africa will have the largest population come 2050!