With the rising prices of electricity, countries are scrambling to get a hold of renewable resources of energy, and the most popular of which is solar. So, where can you best get solar energy? The Sahara may be the first you look at, and rightfully so.
The sun beats down on the Sahara Desert for most of the year, and countries are starting to recognize its potential. Imagine harnessing the power of the sun to provide electricity for millions of homes. That would already address the problem on fluctuating electricity costs.
Experts from several European countries are maximizing of the huge output of solar energy in places that surround the gigantic Sahara Desert. In fact, a massive undersea power cable is already being built and it’s on its way from Egypt to Europe, hopefully supplying a total of 7 million homes in the future.
The GREGY connection is set to bring a total of 3,000 megawatts of renewable energy, and this will run from northern Egypt to Attica, Greece. “Approximately one third (of the electricity that will come from Egypt) will be consumed in Greece, and mainly in Greek industries, another third will be exported to neighboring European countries and one third will be used in Greece, for the production of green hydrogen. The majority of this hydrogen will also be exported to neighboring European countries,” said Ioannis Karydas, CEO of Renewables, Copelouzos Group.
This innovative piece of technology will hopefully be fully operational in about 8 years. As said earlier, around one-third of the cable’s supply will power Greece’s heavier industry, another third will then be exported with the help of the shared grids so that other European countries such as Bulgaria and Italy will benefit from it.
As for the final third, this will be allotted to producing what they call green hydrogen. “By bringing 3 gigawatts of clean energy to Europe, via Greece, we are helping Europe wean itself off Russia’s fossil fuels and natural gas. Also, the green energy we will transport will be much cheaper than today’s energy prices. You understand that this will help both Greek and European consumers,” added Karydas.
Right now, there is hardcore effort from experts to decarbonize, and they are hopeful because this has been done once before via the XLinks Moroccan-UK Power Project. The said project makes use of a similar undersea cable that runs from Morocco all the way to Devon, UK. This means that the wires run a total of 2,300 miles and brings in 10 gigawatts of power.
A spokesman for Xlinks had shared, “This ‘first of a kind’ project will generate 10.5GW of zero carbon electricity from the sun and wind to deliver 3.6GW of reliable energy for an average of 20+ hours a day.”
“Alongside the consistent output from its solar panels and wind turbines, an onsite 20GWh/5GW battery facility provides sufficient storage to reliably deliver each and every day, a dedicated, near-constant source of flexible and predictable clean energy for Britain, designed to complement the renewable energy already generated across the UK,” the spokesman added.
Egypt’s solar fields have benefited from connections with the other North African countries like Libya and Sudan. They also have plans of becoming the most prominent and the largest exporters of renewable energy to all of southeast Europe.
Indeed, this is news that the whole world can celebrate. This will give them hope that they too will become recipients of renewable energy, one that can cut their costs to a significant and affordable amount.
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