The Shandong Provincial Energy Administration has issued a request for proposals for the development of ten offshore solar photovoltaic (PV) projects with a total capacity of 11.25 GW. Binzhou, Dongying, Weifang, Yantai, Weihai, Qingdao, and other areas around Shandong’s coast will be developed for the projects. The pile-based fixed offshore solar projects in Shandong will be allocated through market competition. The bid submission deadline is June 1, 2022.
According to Shandong province’s overall offshore solar capacity deployment, the installations will adhere to the unified planning and layout at the provincial level, allocation of resources, and development and construction. The bidders must be registered in China as legal persons with the ability to integrate the investment, construction, and operation of offshore new energy projects or surface PV projects. In the previous three years, bidders must not have been involved in any major production safety accident in the new energy industry. They should have a sound safety management system in place as well as an excellent track record when it comes to production safety.
In March 2022, the Chinese government planned to construct 450 GW of renewable energy generating projects in the Gobi Arid and other desert areas to accomplish its sustainability goals. The government intended to establish solar and wind energy installations in the area as part of this initiative. Accordingly, ultra-high voltage electricity transmission lines and coal-fired power plants would be required to secure the power grid’s stability in order to accommodate large-scale renewable energy installations in the country.
REGlobal’s Views: With land constraints often hampering solar PV growth, there is a massive untapped potential in deployment of offshore solar power plants. These projects, once online, will provide a huge impetus to China’s solar power growth story.
