Photo: Kev from Pixabay
The winners of all six solar power projects in the latest auction round in Turkey got a 20-year guaranteed price at the low end of the range, just USD 3.25 per MWh. Moreover, in the second phase of bidding they offered to pay one-off contribution shares of between USD 67,000 per MW and USD 270,000 per MW.
Total investments are valued at USD 500 million. Kalyon will build a facility of 385 MW in grid connection capacity just south of its existing 1 GW Karapınar photovoltaic plant in Konya.
The Turkish Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources completed an auction for 800 MW of wind power. The winners are getting grid connections for 49 years, a minimum price during the six-year open market sale period and a guaranteed price for another 20 years.
The auction mechanism is called Renewable Energy Zones (REZ), better known by its Turkish acronym YEKA. Companies competed for five wind farm projects in five designated areas.
Winners get at least USD 49.5 per MWh for first five years after commissioning
Under the conditions for the REZ SPP-2024 – YEKA GES-2024 round, operators will sell electricity in the open market in the first five years after commissioning. However, they are guaranteed at least 4.95 United States dollar cents per kilowatt-hour (USD 49.5 per MWh).
Participants had a range of 3.25 cents to 5.5 cents per kilowatt-hour for their initial financial bids for each zone, followed by a live auction. All projects were awarded at the lowest possible guaranteed price, 3.25 cents, the results show.
Four out of the six best bidders will pay more in contribution shares than the highest sum from last week’s wind power auctions
Since there was more than one such bid for all YEKA solar power zones, the firms competed further by offering so-called contribution shares, starting at USD 10,000 per MW of the predetermined capacity.
The competition was even fiercer than in the wind power auctions from the same round. The ministry received 146 applications from 67 companies. Four out of six winners will pay more than the highest contribution share from the bidding that was held last week.
Combined electricity output to reach 1.5 TWh per year
Minister Alparslan Bayraktar estimated total investments at USD 500 million and said they would result in 1.5 TWh in annual output. It is the equivalent of the electricity needs of 600,000 Turkish households.
The six projects will prevent gas imports of 300 million cubic meters per year, translating to USD 3 billion over a 20-year period, Bayraktar added.
Strong interest in Van zone auction catapults contribution margin to USD 270,000 per MW
The highest number of applications 33, came in for the smallest PV project. Kütahya, seen at 40 MW, is in the province of the same name in western Turkey. The site is in Aslanapa district. Çumra Güneş Enerjisi ve Üretim snatched the zone with a contribution margin of USD 162,000 per MW.
Another 40 MW project, in Gazipaşa in Antalya, went to Erdem Soft Tekstil for USD 122,000 per MW.
Next in size is a zone for 60 MW in Van province. The auction authority said Chen Solar Energy won among 23 applicants, after 21 rounds of bidding. There were only between six and thirteen rounds for the other projects. The company is now obligated to pay a stunning USD 270,000 per MW – USD 16.2 million in total!
The location is east of the Van lake in Saray district, which borders Iran.
The Malatya zone in Eastern Anatolia is for a connection capacity of 75 MW. The best bidder in the 13th round was Özerka Enerji Elektrik Üretim. It got the project in Darende district in Malatya province for USD 232,000 per MW.
Temmuz Güneş Enerji Üretim won the proposed unit of 200 MW in Karaman province for USD 150,000 per MW. It is in Ayrancı district. There were 23 applicants and the bidding lasted only six rounds.
Kalyon set to grow its Karapınar solar power complex to 1.87 GW in peak capacity
The biggest unit is Karapınar, for 385 MW, and only nine companies entered the ring. Kalyon, which already built its PV plant of 1 GW in connection capacity just north from the auctioned zone, swept it for USD 67,000 per MW. The existing facility is also called Karapınar, like the district in Konya province where it is located. The first project was facilitated through the first YEKA auction.
The company said the new plant’s peak capacity would be 520 MW. It compares to the 1.35 GW already in operation. Kalyon expects the second solar park to generate 1.07 TWh per year. It said it would employ 1,100 people in the construction phase and that 75 workers would operate the giant PV system in central Turkey.
The company claims the domestic content rate at its solar module factory is as high as 90%
Importantly, Kalyon Holding manufactures its own PV panels in Ankara, in a joint venture with China Electronic Technology Group Corp. (CETC). The factory was built with massive government subsidies.
The new project will feature 870,000 modules, the company revealed. It claimed that its domestic content rate is as high as 90%. The threshold for participation in the auction was 75%, though only after the raw wafer stage.
YEKA auctions resulted in 1.5 GW in operational PV capacity
Total solar power capacity in Turkey is nearing 20 GW, according to Ember.
The government so far held auctions for 7.85 GW through the YEKA wind and solar power scheme. Tenders for photovoltaics amounted to 3.8 GW. In the meantime, 1.5 GW was commissioned in the solar power segment, while projects for 630 MW in total were canceled. The rest is under development.
Only 301 MW of wind power was commissioned by the end of 2024 from the capacity awarded in the three auction rounds held before the latest one. The contract with the consortium that won the YEKA RES-1 wind power auction in 2017, of 1 GW, was officially canceled last year.
Be the first one to comment on this article.