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Uzbekistan to attract South Korean loan for solar power plant construction

23 December 2013 17:37 (UTC+04:00)
Uzbekistan to attract South Korean loan for solar power plant construction

By Aynur Jafarova

Uzbekistan plans to attract South Korean loan for construction of a solar photovoltaic power plant, a source at Uzbek governmental circles told Baku-based Trend news agency on December 20.

The power plant with capacity of 100 megawatt is planned to be built in the country's Samarqand province.

The source said during his recent visit to South Korea, Uzbek Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Rustam Azimov signed an intergovernmental memorandum of understanding on technical and financial participation of South Korea in the development of solar energy in Uzbekistan.

South Korean Economic Development Cooperation Fund (EDCF) will allocate loan worth $75 million for implementation of this project, the source noted.

The project of construction of the first photovoltaic solar power plant in Central Asia envisages the installation of generating facilities of 100 megawatt with a capacity of 200 million kilowatt hours of electricity per year.

Earlier the Asian Development Bank (ADB) said the first photovoltaic solar power plant in Uzbekistan will be constructed no earlier than 2019.

"This project will take five years and is supposed to be completed in March 2019," the ADB said.

Uzbekistan's potential of renewable energy sources amounts to about 51 billion tons of oil equivalent. The country's hydropower potential is 9.2 million tons of oil equivalents, while the potential of solar energy with 300 sunny days per year is 50.973 billion tons, wind potential 2.2 million tons and geothermal waters 0.2 million tons of oil equivalents.

In early 2013, Uzbekistan developed a set of measures for development of alternative sources of energy. The country established the International Institute for Solar Energy jointly with ADB in September 2013.

The institute is aimed to implement high-tech developments in the field of industrial application of solar energy, to conduct applied researches, related to the use of solar energy in various sectors of economy and to coordinate the development of documentation for major projects in the field of solar energy.

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