The UAE has announced what it says will be the world’s 1st large-scale round-the-clock (RTC) gigascale project combining 5 GW DC solar PV and 19 GWh of battery storage capacity to produce 1 GW of continuous, uninterrupted baseload renewable energy capacity.
It will be the largest combined solar and battery energy storage system (BESS) in the world, according to the Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company Masdar and the Emirates Water and Electricity Company (EWEC) that will execute the project in partnership. The duo announced the same at the Abu Dhabi Sustainability Summit 2025.
Masdar’s Chairman and the Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology in the UAE Dr. Sultan Al Jaber called intermittency as the biggest barrier facing renewable energy and the ‘moonshot challenge of our time’. “For the first time ever, this will transform renewable energy into a world-leading 1GW of reliable baseload energy every day on an unprecedented scale – a first step that could become a giant leap for the world,” he added.
For Masdar that targets a renewable energy portfolio of 100 GW by 2030, this will be its largest and most ambitious project to date.
The project also supports the UAE’s Energy Strategy 2050 under which it targets to install 19.8 GW of clean energy capacity by 2030 and achieve net zero status by 2050.