A renewable energy storage was inaugurated Thursday at the Noor Ouarzazate solar complex, in the framework of a joint project between the Moroccan Agency for Sustainable Energy (Masen) and Swedish group Azelio. The inauguration ceremony took place in the presence of Chairman of MASEN Board, Mustapha Bakkoury, Swedish ambassador to Morocco, Niklas Kebbon, Chairman of the Board of Azelio, Bo Dankis, as well as representatives from several African countries and the World Bank. «Our collaboration with Azelio is a good example of Masen's R&D strategy to evaluate, co-develop and promote disruptive solutions», said Mustapha Bakkoury. This partnership between Masen and Azelio solves the problem of solar energy storage in an innovative way, as it can provide solutions in this field that can be applied to very small and large-scale projects, as well as in the area of rural electrification, which represents a great challenge on the African continent, Bakkoury told MAP. The inauguration of this renewable energy storage is «a big step for us and for our partner Masen», Dankis said, noting that collaboration between the two sides is «very professional» at all levels. «This is a very good example of cross-border cooperation between Morocco and Sweden, which top the ranking of the countries closest to achieving their objectives in the fight against climate change», said the Swedish ambassador to Morocco. A verification of the storage will be initiated during the first quarter of 2020, with commercial installations later the same year, followed by volume production in 2021. Azelio has developed a solution to efficiently store renewable energy from solar and wind power and make it available all hours of the day as electricity and heat. The system uses recycled aluminum as a storage medium, containing no rare minerals and suffers no reduced capacity over time. The system is scalable from 100 kW to 100 MW and by that fills a void in the market towards the goal of universal access to affordable and sustainable energy.
