According to a news release, Saudi Arabia plans to derive 10% of its electrical supply from the sun, and eventually emerge as the world’s largest source of solar energy. The Saudi government hopes that the country will be able to generate 5 gigawatts of solar energy by 2020.

The news release goes on to say that the government expects the move will create up to 15,000 jobs and encourage the development of solar farms and plants for processing of raw materials and assembly, and other related facilities. Investors have already pledged more than three billion US Dollars to fund solar panel component plants in Al Madinah province’s Yanbu port and in Jubail city in the Eastern province, the report revealed. (“Solar energy to generate 10 per cent of electricity production in Saudi Arabia by 2020”, January 8, 2012, http://www.saudi-energy.com)

Tawfiq M Attari, Technical and Sales Director for MENA Market, DuctSox, believes that the aggressive move to harness solar energy will give a boost to the country’s HVACR sector. “This is because logically, electricity will become cheaper, and consequently, installation of air conditioning units and ducting systems will increase,” he said. “In fact, I think it will increase the entire quantum of investment in the Saudi market, not just in the solar energy sector, but in the industry subsidiary, which will increase the number of factories, which, in turn, will increase the HVACR requirement for them.”

Ahmad Abushama, Director, Business Development, Dalkia Utilities Co, Dubai, thinks that this spells good news for his company. “Dalkia has over than 100MW of installed capacity for solar power plants using PV technology,” he reveals. “We have executed several solar plants in Europe and are looking to apply the same here in the GCC market. Recently, our consortium was shortlisted to undertake the feasibility study of 50MW CSP plant in Jordan. Though solar power is not yet mature in the GCC region, yet I believe it will be a very good alternative, which can partially offset the large dependence on using fossil fuels. The effect of solar energy on the HVACR sector is indirectly positive. We will see more studies regarding having DC powered by hybrid systems – conventional Power and solar.”