Many countries and territories have installed significant solar power capacity into their electrical grids to supplement or provide an alternative to conventional energy sources. Solar power plants use one of two technologies:
India's solar power installed capacity was 73.32 GWAC as of 31 December 2023.
The developing nations of Africa are popular locations for the application of renewable energy technology. Currently, many nations already have small-scale solar, wind, and geothermal devices in operation providing energy to urban and rural populations. These types of energy production are especially useful in remote locations because of the excessive cost of transporting electricity from large-scale power plants. The applications of renewable energy technology has the potential to alleviate many of the problems that face Africans every day, especially if done in a sustainable manner that prioritizes human rights.
Solar power has a small role in electricity production in the United Kingdom.
SolarReserve was a developer of utility-scale solar power projects which include Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) and Photovoltaic (PV) technology. The company has commercialized solar thermal energy storage technology that enables solar power tower CSP plants to deliver electricity day and night. In this technology, a molten salt is used to capture the energy from the sun and store it. When electricity is needed, the stored liquid salt is used to turn water into steam to turn a turbine and generate electricity.
Postmasburg is a town in the Northern Cape province of South Africa.
The National Solar Mission is an initiative of the Government of India and State Governments to promote solar power. The mission is one of the several policies of the National Action Plan on Climate Change. The program was inaugurated as the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on 11 January 2010 with a target of 20 GW by 2022. This was later increased to 100 GW by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the 2015 Union budget of India. India increased its utility solar power generation capacity by nearly 5 times from 2,650 MW on 26 May 2014 to 12,288.83 MW on 31 March 2017. The country added 9,362.65 MW in 2017–18, the highest of any year. The original target of 20 GW was surpassed in 2018, four years ahead of the 2022 deadline.
A photovoltaic power station, also known as a solar park, solar farm, or solar power plant, is a large-scale grid-connected photovoltaic power system designed for the supply of merchant power. They are different from most building-mounted and other decentralized solar power because they supply power at the utility level, rather than to a local user or users. Utility-scale solar is sometimes used to describe this type of project.
Solar power in South Africa includes photovoltaics (PV) as well as concentrated solar power (CSP). In 2016, South Africa had 1,329 MW of installed solar power capacity. Installed capacity is expected to reach 8,400 MW by 2030.
The Jasper Solar Energy Project is a 96 megawatt (MW) photovoltaic power station, located 120 km west of Kimberley, in South Africa's Northern Cape. Construction of the project was completed in October 2014 and it is fully operational to power up to 80,000 homes.
ACWA Power is a developer, investor, co-owner and operator of a portfolio of power generation and desalinated water production plants with a presence in 12 countries across the Middle East, Africa, Central and South-East Asia. ACWA Power's portfolio of projects in operation and development has an investment value in excess of USD 74.8 billion, and a capacity of more than 50 GW of power and 7.6 million m3/day of desalinated water.
Tororo Solar Power Station, also Tororo Solar North Power Station, is a 10 megawatts (13,000 hp) solar power plant in Uganda, the third-largest economy in the East African Community.
The Letsatsi Solar Park is a 75-megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic power station in Bloemfontein, Free State, South Africa. The solar park uses 277,632 conventional, multicrystalline silicon PV solar panels and went fully on line in May 2014. Its annual generation will be about 150 gigawatt-hours, enough to supply electricity for about 50,000 to 60,000 homes, while reducing the use of pollution-generating fossil fuels. The Letsatsi Solar Park cost $487 million and is operated by the Letsatsi Solar Energy Ltd., which plans to operate the solar park for at least 20 years.
Redstone Solar Thermal Power (RSTP) is a solar power tower with molten salt energy storage, located in Postmasburg, near Kimberley, in the Northern Cape Region of South Africa. Redstone will have a capacity of 100 megawatts (MW) to deliver power to 200,000 people and was awarded in bid window 3.5 of the REIPPP at a strike price of 122.3 ZAR/KWh including time of day pricing in 2015. The project was initially based on the technology of now bankrupt Solar Reserve, but was delayed for several years because the PPA was not signed by Eskom until 2018. After the project was revived the plant is now under construction and the technology will be provided by Brightsource and John Cockerill, as demonstrated in the Noor Energy 1 project in the UAE.
DLO Energy Resources Group (PTY) LTD is an independent power producer headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa with primary operations in renewable energy, solar power and wind power.
