Firms Pursue Solar Power From Sahara

By ULRIKE DAUER
MUNICH -- A group of 12 European companies agreed to push forward on a solar-power project intended to feed electricity to Europe from the Sahara.
European finance, technology and energy giants, including Deutsche Bank AG, Siemens AG, ABB Ltd. and E.On AG, signed a memorandum of understanding to develop a feasible plan over the next three years.
If the plan is workable, the group would aim to build its first thermal solar power plant by 2015, said Munich Re management board member Torsten Jeworrek, who is coordinating the initiative for his company and the others. The project -- dubbed Desertec -- would aim to provide up to 15% of Europe's electricity by 2050, as well as address growing energy needs in North Africa and the Middle East.
Member companies will contribute about €1.8 million ($2.5 million) in the first year, Mr. Jeworrek said. If the plan goes forward, the group will look for more members and a bigger financing base, he said.
The project would likely face political, financial and technological issues. The Club of Rome, a global think tank connected with the project, in a recent study estimated that roughly €400 billion would be needed to build enough thermal solar power plants to meet the target.
Power plants -- which would cover an area of 16,900 square kilometers -- would cost €350 billion; €50 billion would be required for the high-voltage direct current transmission lines to transport the electricity to Europe from North Africa.
Hermann Scheer, a member of Germany's lower house of parliament and president of Eurosolar, a nongovernment organization promoting renewable energy, criticized the project's costs estimates as too low and said he was in favor of decentralized production of Europe's supply with renewable energies within Europe, rather than trying to rely on a new outside source for a big share of it.
Write to Ulrike Dauer at ulrike.dauer@dowjones.com