Iraq is set to open its first industrial-scale solar plant in a vast desert area in Karbala as the government attempts to tackle an electricity crisis that has led to widespread blackouts.

Authorities said the plant, the largest of its kind in Iraq, will be inaugurated on Sunday to eventually produce up to 300 megawatts of electricity at its peak, according to Iraqi media reports.

Tens of thousands of black panels are set out in rows in a huge desert area, spanning some 4,000 dunams (1,000 acres or 400 hectares) in the al-Hur area of Karbala, located southwest of capital Baghdad.

Nasser Karim al-Sudani, head of the national team for solar energy projects in the Iraqi prime minister’s office, said another project under construction in Babil province will have a capacity of 225 megawatts,

See Full Page