Saudi Arabia invites prequalification for 1.2GW round of solar projects
Saudi Arabia’s Renewable Energy Project Development Office (Repdo) has invited companies to submit prequalification documents for four photovoltaic (PV) solar projects with a total combined capacity of 1.2GW under the third round of the kingdom’s National Renewable Energy Programme (NREP).
Repdo has invited developers to submit prequalification entries by 6 February for the four PV projects.
Two of the PV independent power producer (IPP) projects will be tendered as ‘Category A’ projects, with two to be designated as ‘Category B’ schemes.
The Category A projects are:
• Wadi ad-Dawasir, 120MW
• Layla, 80MW
The Category B projects are:
• Ar-Rass, 700MW
• Saad, 300MW
As with the second round of the NREP, companies can apply to be prequalified as either ‘Managing Member’; and/or ‘Technical Member’; and/or ‘Local Managing Member.’
According to the request for qualification (RFQ) document, companies that were prequalified as either of these three participants in the second round of the NREP will automatically be prequalified for the third round and will not need to resubmit prequalification documents.
All three categories of prequalified companies will be eligible to bid for the smaller Category A projects, with participation in the tender for Category B projects restricted to Managing Members and Technical Members.
Parties which fail to prequalify in either of the above three categories will be able to join consortiums with prequalified companies following the conclusion of the prequalification round.
Each project will be developed under a build-own-operate (BOO) model, with the successful bidder holding 100 per cent equity in the special purpose vehicle (SPV) set up to developer and operate the IPP.
SPVs will sign a 25-year power purchase agreement (PPA) with the kingdom’s offtaker. Land for the projects will be secured by Repdo and provided to the project company under sub-lease agreements.
The client is targeting to issue the notice of prequalification to prequalified companies by 24 February, and is planning to issue the request for proposals (RFP) on 22 March. Bid submission is planned for July this year.
Bidders are due to select proposals for six PV solar projects under the second round on 20 January.
The four category B projects under the second round are:
• Al-Faisaliah solar PV IPP: Mecca Province, approximately 80km south of Jeddah city (600MW)
• Jeddah solar PV IPP: Mecca Province, approximately 50km southeast of Jeddah city (300MW)
• Qurayyat solar PV independent power project (IPP): Al-Jawf Province, approximately 15 kilometres from Qurayyat city (200MW)
• Rabigh solar PV IPP: Mecca Province, approximately 145km north of Jeddah city (300MW)
The two projects in category A are:
• Medina solar PV IPP: Medina Province, approximately 26km from Medina city (50MW)
• Rafha solar PV IPP: Northern Borders Province, approximately 16km from Rafha city (20MW)
Repdo prequalified 60 firms to participate in the bidding process for the second round of the NREP. The prequalified firms include managing partners, technical members and local managing members for category A projects and managing and technical members for category B schemes.
Repdo’s advisers for the second and third rounds are Japan’s Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) as lead and financial adviser, Germany’s Fichtner as technical adviser and the UK’s DLA Piper as legal adviser.
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