Saudi Arabia?s ACWA Power has signed strategic agreements with three Chinese entities on the sidelines of the second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation (BRF)
The agreements with PowerChina, China Gezhouba Group Company (CGGC) and Bank of China will lay the ground for collaboration in major investments and further involve Chinese expertise in manufacturing power generation and desalinated water production plants that ACWA Power develops and operates.
Paddy Padmanathan, president and CEO ACWA Power, said, ?The sum of growing collaborations between ACWA Power and Chinese entities only solidifies the relationship of trust and companionship between us and our Chinese partners. It goes beyond merely conducting business ? it is a reflection of the robust Saudi-Chinese ties that we have nurtured along the years.?
First out of three agreements took place during the Belt and Road CEO conference. Padmanathan, president and CEO of ACWA Power, and WANG Lujun, chairman of SEPCO III, signed an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract which grants SEPCO III Electric Power Construction Corporation, a subsidiary of PowerChina, to serve as the EPC contractor of Al Taweelah desalination plant.
Following the first signing, ACWA Power entered into an agreement with China Gezhouba Group International Engineering Company (CGGC Intl). Mohammed Abunayyan, chairman of ACWA Power, signed a cooperation agreement with Lyu Zexiang, chairman of CGGC Intl, outlining that CGGC was announced in 2018 as the official EPC contractor for Nam Dinh 1, a Greenfield independent power project (IPP) based in Vietnam.
CGGC will also assist sponsors in obtaining project financing from Chinese financial institutions. Co-developed by ACWA Power and Korean Taekwang Power, the project was finalised at a total investment cost of more than US$2.4bn with a production capacity of 1,200MW in the first phase.
The power generation operator concluded its agreements with a MoU signed between Rajit Nanda, chief investment officer at ACWA Power, and ZHANG Wei, the general manager of Bank of China (Hongkong) Hochiminh City Branch. The MoU incorporates general financial service agreements for Nam Dinh 1 IPP.
