EU's African solar farms moves step closer

Long-standing plans to provide the bulk of Europe's energy from solar farms operating in the Sahara desert have moved a step closer to becoming reality after it was revealed that the proposals have secured support from both Gordon Brown and Nicholas Sarkozy.

According to Guardian reports, scientists at the European Commission's Institute for Energy are working on proposals for a new supergrid capable of transmitting electricity thousands of miles from solar panels in the Sahara, wind farms in the North Sea or geothermal power stations in Iceland.

Speaking at the Euroscience Open Forum in Barcelona this week, Arnulf Jaeger-Walden of the Institute for Energy said that photovoltaic solar panels would have to capture just 0.3 per cent of the light falling on the Sahara and Middle East deserts to meet all of Europe's energy needs. The electricity generated could then be transmitted along high voltage direct current (HVDC) cables that, unlike existing AC networks, minimise energy losses over long distances.

The Guardian claims both Nicholas Sarkozy and Gordon Brown have signaled support for the proposals, which could cost more than €1bn (£790m) a year for every year up to 2050.

The team working on the proposals are confident that not only does the €450bn (£356bn) project represent good value when compared with the International Energy Agency's recent estimate that it would cost $45 trillion (£22.5 trillion) to build a low carbon economy over the next 30 years, but that it could deliver 100GW of clean energy by 2050, more than the UK's current electricity generation capacity.

The news follows a number of feasibility studies carried out by the German government in 2006 that similarly found that the emergence of HVDC cables meant the solar power of North Africa could be used to power much of Europe. Scientists working under the auspices of the Trans-Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation group have similarly long argued that solar thermal farms across the Mediterranean region could be developed to provide a reliable energy source for much of the continent.