Morocco’s solar energy agency, Masen, has postponed the inauguration ceremony for the Noor-1 concentrated solar power (CSP) plant, which was originally planned to be held on December 27th 2015, without providing any reasons.

According to AFP, the communications agency acting on behalf of Masen couldn’t explain for the last-minute delay.

Situated in the Moroccan city of Ouarzazate, the solar plant aims to create 2 GW of solar generation capacity by 2020, meeting 38% of Morocco’s annual electricity needs, and cutting the country’s carbon emissions by 240,000 tons per year.

The first phase of the Noor-1 CSP plant is 160MW in capacity. Once the entire complex is finished, there will be 580MW total in size, making it the world’s largest solar power production project.

Phases two and three – Noor-2 and Noor-3 – are scheduled to be completed in 2016 and 2017 respectively, and there is already a call open for tenders for Noor-4. However, this unexpected setback may heap further delays on to the project.

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Source: PVmagazine
Photo Credit: flickr