Sichuan’s first CSP project gets environmental OK in Phase I of a 2GW solar park

Aba County, Sichuan Province, IMAGE © Creative Commons

[Ed: Though Sichuan as a whole has a poor solar resource for CSP, Aba County itself has excellent DNI. It is located in the northwestern part of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau with a thin and clean atmosphere, and a high number of cloud-free days.]

Source: From CSTA

Sichuan Province is set to get its first concentrated solar power plant. The Aba Prefecture Ecological Environment Bureau has approved Phase I of the Aba Maikun “CSP + PV” Integrated Power Generation Demonstration Project (Azhou Environmental Approval No. 42 of 2026).

Across two phases, the project will total 2 GW: 200 MW of CSP and 1,800 MW of PV, with a total investment of about 9.2 billion yuan.

It is Sichuan’s first tower CSP project and its first large-scale CSP demonstration project. It is also the province’s first CSP + PV hybrid. Aba sits high on the plateau in northwestern Sichuan, where direct normal irradiance (DNI) is strong, unlike most of the province.

Phase I totals 1 GW: a 100 MW molten salt tower CSP plant with thermal storage and 900 MW of PV. The PV uses a “grass-solar complementary” approach, sharing the land with grassland. Phase I will cost about 4.425 billion yuan, excluding the outgoing transmission line and grid-side upgrades. It is located in Maierma Town, Anqiang Town and Maikun Township in Aba County, at an altitude of roughly 3,600 to 3,900 meters.

The CSP plant will have a 255-meter receiver tower and a heliostat field of about 400,000 square meters. Its molten salt thermal storage will provide both peak-shaving and stable output. Shouhang Energy Saving Solar Technology Co., Ltd. won the contract for the solar field and receiver system, worth 187 million yuan.

Phase I also includes a 110 kV step-up substation for the CSP plant, two 220 kV step-up substations for the PV, and energy storage facilities. A connection for centralized clean energy heating is built in. Once complete, it can heat about 500,000 square meters of buildings in Aba County town.

Sichuan Shudao Clean Energy Group Co., Ltd. leads the project, with CGN Wind Power and PowerChina’s Chengdu Engineering Corporation Limited. In September, two PV EPC contracts were awarded. One went to Chengdu Engineering Corporation Limited. The other went to The IT Electronics Eleventh Design & Research Institute Scientific and Technological Engineering Corporation Limited, in a consortium with Highland Build Co., Ltd.

The bureau said the site is in a highly ecologically sensitive area. Prefecture environmental officials worked with other departments to assess and refine the plans for grassland protection, impacts on wild plants and animals, and fit with the landscape. The bureau said this let it shorten the approval process while holding to its ecological protection limits.

The bureau said the project’s model of “CSP peak-shaving + PV generation + urban heating” will build practical experience for combining renewable energy sources in Sichuan’s high-altitude alpine regions. It added that the project will support the low-carbon transition of the Aba Plateau.

The post Sichuan’s first CSP project gets environmental OK in Phase I of a 2GW solar park appeared first on SolarPACES.