eSolar takes solar thermal to Sub-Saharan Africa

Pasadena, Calif.-based eSolar said today its signed a deal with Johannesburg-based Clean Energy Solutions to sell and market the startup's solar thermal power plants in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The deal gives eSolar a presence on three continents. The company is operating a 5-megawatt demonstration facility in California, and has signed deals with developers in the U.S. and India (see eSolar completes 5-MW power-tower solar plant as NRG waits in wings).

The latest agreement calls for Clean Energy Solutions to open a new entity, eSolarSA, to have the exclusive rights to sell the concentrating solar technology in the seven-country region including the Republic of South Africa, Namibia and Botswana.  

"Africa boasts one of the highest solar resources on the planet," said Bill Gross, CEO of eSolar, in a news release. 

Many companies see South Africa as an entry point into the the African market (see Plug Power sells 120 fuel cell power systems in South Africa). 

Last year, a report by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa said the country's economy lost ZAR 50 billion ($6.67 billion) because of state-owned utility Esko's trouble meeting peak demand. The report estimated Esko shed 4,000 MW during peak demand, causing outages that disrupted businesses, traffic, industry, hospitals, homes, and schools—even forcing the major mining groups shut down operations due to safety concerns in January 2008 (see BioTherm gets $150M to address energy crisis in S. Africa).

ESolar developed a modular, scalable solar thermal power technology that focuses thousands of mirrors on a single point to efficiently harvest the sun’s energy and reduce costs (see Cleantech Group picks winners and losers in concentrated solar thermal). The key element of eSolar's technology lies in software that operates the solar field with the necessary degree of precision and reliability.

Last month, eSolar tapped engineering firm Fluor (NYSE:FLR) to develop designs for 46-MW solar-thermal power plants, with the blueprints to be licensed to developers across the globe (see Fluor building solar-thermal blueprints for eSolar to license globally).

India’s Acme Group paid $30 million for a 5-percent stake in eSolar, giving it the exclusive license to eSolar's technology in India, as well as the right to develop 1,000 MW of solar thermal projects in the next 10 years (see Solar sell-off accelerates and Acme plans to beat eSolar on cost of solar thermal in India).

ESolar also struck a deal to sell an equity stake and development rights to three U.S. projects to Princeton, N.J.-based NRG Energy (NYSE:NRG) (see NRG Energy, eSolar sign 500 MW solar deal). 

Last year, eSolar raised a $130 million round from Idealab, Google and Oak Investment Partners (see Going modular with eSolar). It has 135 employees.