TEHRAN – Head of the Energy Committee of Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture (ICCIMA) has said European companies, especially German firms, are currently willing to provide Iran with solar panel production lines, IRNA reported.

According to Arash Najafi, the mentioned companies are also ready to purchase the electricity generated by the solar farms established by the mentioned panels on a guaranteed price basis.

Najafi noted that the government should consider bartering crude oil and oil products with the necessary equipment and machinery for manufacturing solar panels and renewable power plants in order to help develop this sector.

“The government can invest in renewable energies for a limited time by bartering oil and petroleum products in order to help the development of renewable energy and increase the capacity of such power plants in the country, and this is a logical solution,” he said.

He also mentioned the Energy Ministry’s program for obligating high-consumption subscribers to install PV stations to generate their own electricity, saying: “The government's offer to high-consumption subscribers to use renewable energy is a sensible offer that will help develop this sector.”

The official noted that promoting the use of rooftop PV stations is a good way for developing the renewable industry in the country.

Earlier this month, Energy Ministry and some of the country’s private contractors signed memorandums of understanding (MOU) for cooperation in the construction of renewable power plants to generate 10,000 megawatts (10 gigawatts) of electricity across Iran.

The MOUs were signed following the Energy Ministry’s public call for the contribution of private companies in a project for developing renewable power plants in the country.

Speaking in the signing ceremony, Energy Minister Ali-Akbar Mehrabian said: “When the private sector invests in this industry [the renewables], the government is obliged to return the equivalent of the investment plus its interests to the investor.”

Mehrabian noted that the government has allocated over 30 trillion rials (about $105.4 million) for the development of renewables in the budget bill for the next Iranian calendar year (begins on March 21), saying that it is an unprecedented budget in this area.

EF/MA