The Government of Uzbekistan has announced tenders for solar projects with a cumulative capacity of 1.4 GW.

Under the first tender, 1 GW of solar projects will be developed with the support of the Asian Development Bank. A site situated in the Sherabad district of the Surkhandarya region has been selected for the construction of the project.

The bid submission deadline for the 1 GW tender is August 25, 2020.

Under the second tender, 400 MW of projects are slated to be developed. Sites situated in the Gallaorol district of Jizzakh region and Kattakurgan district of Samarkand region have been selected for the construction of the projects. These projects will be developed with the assistance of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the financial arm of the World Bank.

The interested companies and associates need to submit their applications by September 26, 2020.

Previously, the country had invited Expressions of Interest from international investors to develop 400 MW of solar independent power producer projects in the regions of Samarkand and Jizzakh.

The government has announced all three tenders intending to attract qualified private developers-investors for the projects under its new Public-Private Partnership law. Various ministries of the Uzbekistan government, like the Ministry of Foreign Trade, the Ministry of Energy, and the Public-Private Partnership Development Agency under the Ministry of Finance, will support all three projects, the press statement added.

Despite having significant solar potential, Uzbekistan is highly dependent on natural gas for its electricity generation. The government aims to develop renewable energy to diversify the country’s energy mix and attract private investment in the sector. The country is in the process of implementing an ambitious renewable energy strategy to deploy 5 GW of solar capacity in the next ten years.

In October 2019, Masdar (or Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company) announced it had won the bid to develop Uzbekistan’s first public-private solar partnership project under the IFC’s “Scaling Solar” program.