Britain to harness power of Sahara solar farms using world’s biggest cable-laying ship

‘The project has already been declared one of “national significance” by Claire Coutinho, the Energy Secretary, who has also set a team of civil servants to work on it’, says the story. A claim of ‘near-constant’ electricity supply from one of the project team sounds a tad optimistic. Sandstorms are not unheard of in the Sahara region, for example. [Click on image to enlarge]
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A project to power Britain using solar farms thousands of miles away in the Sahara is moving a step closer to fruition as its backers prepare to commission the world’s biggest cable-laying ship, says The Telegraph.

The 700ft vessel will lay four parallel cables linking solar and wind farms spread across the desert in Morocco with a substation in Alverdiscott, a tiny village near the coast of north Devon.

Once completed, the scheme is expected to deliver about 3.6 gigawatts of electricity to the UK’s national grid – equating to about 8pc of total power demand.

Xlinks, the business behind the project, expects the ship to cost several hundred million pounds and be capable of carrying 200 miles of power cables, coiled and ready for deployment on the seafloor.

James Humfrey, new chief executive of subsidiary Xlinks First, said the vessel would lay two 100-mile lengths of cable at a time, then head back to the UK for the next two lengths.

On returning it would pick up the cable ends, connect them to the next lengths and repeat the process. Commissioning of the ship is expected later this year.

Mr Humfrey said: “This will offer a near constant, clean and affordable supply of electricity to the UK and play a key role in Morocco and the UK’s future prosperity.”

The Xlinks scheme involves laying cables carrying high voltage direct current power along the coasts of Spain, Portugal and France, coming ashore in North Africa.

There, they will connect with seven solar farms and up to 1,000 wind turbines built across an area of Moroccan desert roughly the size of greater London.
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The project has already been declared one of “national significance” by Claire Coutinho, the Energy Secretary, who has also set a team of civil servants to work on it.

It means planning consents for the UK end of the cables will bypass Torridge district council in Devon and instead be determined by the Government. Financial backers include the Abu Dhabi National Energy Company, along with French giant TotalEnergies and British supplier Octopus Energy.
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Mr Morrish [Xlinks CEO] said: “The wind is very reliable because it comes from the daily convection currents of the desert coming in [from] the ocean. It means the wind picks up every afternoon, blows into the evening and drops again in the morning.

“When you add the solar plus batteries for storage we think we can generate an almost constant source of power for the UK – meeting up to 8pc of its electricity requirements.”

An analysis by Rystad Energy, a global energy consultancy, sounded a note of caution. It said: “At times of low wind and solar generation, natural gas or European imports will still be needed to cover demand.”

Full article here.

Image credit: SolarGIS © 2014 GeoModel Solar