Arabia One Solar

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Arabia One (“the Developer”) is a 10 MW solar photovoltaic (PV) power plant located in the MDA, located south of the capital Amman (“the Project”). All output generated by the project will connect to a newly built substation in MDA and will be sold to Jordan’s National Electric Power Company (NEPCO) under a 20-year Power Purchase Agreement (PPA). The project is part of the Government of Jordan’s Renewable Energy Program, which aims to increase renewable energy contribution to 10 percent of the country’s generation mix by 2020. The total project cost is estimated at US$30 million with a proposed IFC loan of approximately US$10.5 million for IFC’s own account and a syndication of up to US$12 million.The direct current (DC) power from the solar panels will be sent to an inverter to convert the DC power into alternate current (AC) power which will then be fed into the utility power grid system through the local substation that is currently under construction by NEPCO. The project site will have 8 zones with PV power arrays using polycrystalline technology. The plant will have a total of 45,192 modules with a total peak power of 11,523.96 kilowatt-peak (kWp). The power conversion station includes a transformer which converts the output to a higher voltage. The power conversion station will then connect with NEPCO’s substation located around 1.8 km to the north of the project site. Existing channels in the MDA master plan will be provided to connect the power plant through underground cables to the substation. The substation, to be managed by NEPCO, will convert power to 132 kV, which will then be transported to the national grid through high voltage transmission lines. The developer will not be responsible for the interconnections as stipulated in the PPA agreement (the Transmission Connection Agreement states that the transmission line leaving the substation and connecting to the grid is the responsibility of NEPCO). The Project is located in Jordan’s Ma’an Governorate which lies 218km South of Amman. The Ma’an Development Area (“MDA”) was established in 2008 under the Development Areas Law. The new solar park, which lies between the MDA’s industrial park and vocational training center, encompasses 11 plots available for solar PV, of which this project is one in plot B-5. The project will be located in an area devoid of human settlements; the nearest local community is located 8km away (city of Ma’an). The entire MDA is 9-square kilometers (km2), and the project site itself is 0.2 km2. The MDC is the major developer of the entire plot of area of the MDA. Under the MDC, there is a neighboring Industrial Park located around 2.5 km to the northeast of the project area. Currently, the Industrial Park has several operating facilities such as a leather tannery, glass factory, bottled water/juice factory, fertilizer production plant, and others. There is also a private farm located to the northwest which is also 5 km away of the project area. Under MDC there is a private university, Al-Hussein Bin Talal University, a partner in MDA with its campus located in Ma’an City, and a Skills Development Center for vocational training of skills for technicians and laborers from the local community to be later employed by the Developers of MDA Solar Park. The project site is near an existing operating railway that runs close to the northern parts of the site, approximately 1km to the north. The railway is operated and managed by the Aqaba Railway Corporation (ARC) and is used for transporting Phosphate from the mines in Ma’an Governorate to Aqaba Governorate. There is a residential community in Ma’an city approximately 8 km away from the project site. While there are no neighboring communities to the MDA Solar Park to be impacted by this project, there are nomadic Bedouins that may graze through the area on occasion.