The Iranian government has signed a memorandum of understanding with an unnamed Danish company to build the country’s first privately-owned wind and solar power plant. The plant will be built near Damghan, in Semnan province, to the east of Tehran, as part of a project totaling up to 1 GW to be built in ten phases of around 100 MW each.
Construction of the first phase is expected to start “in the near future” and the financing will come from a German investor. UnderIran’s Five-Year Economic Development Plan (2010-15) the country aims to add 5 GW of wind and solar capacity by 2016, with wind accounting for 90 per cent of this figure.
To date,Iran has 92 MW of installed capacity, while the potential resource could exceed 15 GW, according to the energy ministry. According to industry sources, private investors have submitted applications for wind power projects with a total capacity of 800 MW.
