Morocco Renewable Energy Megaprojects

Marcopolis.net Video Interview with HE Amina Benkhadra, Minister of Energy, Mines, Water and Environment. Also available here http://www.marcopolis.net/morocco-renewable-energy-megaprojects.htm.

With big economic reforms and new developments in different sectors such as agriculture, industry, infrastructure, and tourism, the demand for energy is increasing by 5% a year for primary energy and almost 7% for the electricity.

To reduce dependency on foreign sources of energy (95% of energy is imported), the government has come up with a strategic plan to invest in renewables, especially in solar and wind energy. By 2012, Morocco is aiming to produce 20% of electricity generated from renewables.

His Majesty has launched two main programs for solar and wind energy. Both plans aim to construct 2,000 megawatts of new electric capacity by 2020 and by this year (2020) renewable energy will represent 42% of the total capacity. Those big projects will need an investment of 12.5 billion dollars.