200 MW ‘Largest’ Solar PV Farm In West Africa

A 200 MW solar power project has been announced in Nigeria by Singapore based renewable energy corporation B&S Power Holding Pte, and Nigerian investor Sunnyfred Global. This, the partners claim is the largest solar PV farm in all of West Africa.

To be located in Ashama village of Delta state in Nigeria, the 200 MW project is planned to be designed, developed, financed and constructed by technical partners with whom the project promoters have already concluded arrangements, stated project consultant and strategic partner to the promoters Greenplinth Africa.

A project roadmap presentation is to be shared by the promoters in a February 25, 2021 session with media and other interested stakeholders.

The PV project would add to Nigeria's electricity generation capacity that's currently insufficient to meet demand as more than 80 million Nigerians are currently living off the grid, and the dominant source of electricity here remains dirty and expensive fossil-fuel powered.

According to African news portal Afrik21, Nigeria's total installed electricity generation capacity is 12.52 GW, with 10.14 GW coming from thermal power plants and the  remaining 2.38 GW from hydroelectric projects. In the space of solar PV, the country's recent focus has been on off grid solar under the World Bank backed Nigeria Electrification Project (NEP) whose implementing agency is the Rural Electrification Agency (REA) (see Efforts To Promote Solar Hybrid Mini Grids In Nigeria). In the past, there have been activities to develop large scale solar on-grid PV power plants, but nothing has materialized so far.