Morroco going green throughWind Power

The French electricity group of I.D.F. Paris signed a contract with the Moroccan Electrical office through which the former will set up an electricity station to generate power from the wind in the Tolan province north of Morocco over a period of 19 years, at a cost of $53 million. A Danish company will also participate in that project.

The total energy generated from this station will be 50 megawatts which represents 2% of the Moroccan needs of electricity. The Moroccan Premier Dr. Abdel Latif Al Filaly who headed the committee responsible for signing the contract in Rabat stated that the new station aims to develop the northern provinces and to enable Morocco to be a pioneering country in the field of generating electricity from the wind.

Work on the project will start at the beginning of 1999 on an area of 370 hectares. This is the first station to be implemented by a French company, as France did not participate in the electricity project in Al Garf Al Asfar whose cost is $1.6 billion which will be implemented by Swedish, American and Swiss companies.

The French companies started to participate in the Moroccan electricity projects after Paris agreed to transfer 1.4 billion francs of French loans to Morocco into investments by French companies wanting to work in Morocco.

Morocco needs to double its electricity capabilities by the year 2000 to offer electricity to the industrial establishments at suitable prices after the shortage of rains decreased the production of the electricity power in Morocco.