Europe's biggest solar farm switched on for Shell and Microsoft

Europe’s largest solar power plant was officially inaugurated at Witznitz near Leipzig in eastern Germany on a former lignite open pit mine – with most of its green power produced going to Shell which will then sell much of it on to Microsoft.

Shell Energy Europe last year had secured a power purchase agreement (PPA) for 600MW out of the 650MW of solar capacity now installed by developer Move On at the Witznitz Energy Park to strengthen its "low-carbon power portfolio".

The oil supermajor has separately agreed to sell the power generated by 323MW of the solar capacity to Microsoft, helping the internet giant to meet its commitment of having a 100% supply of renewable energy by 2025.

The massive solar array is not only showing how the country is moving from dirty to green energy increasingly stabilising the power grid, transmission system operator 50Hertz said.

The TSO said the plant injects electricity directly at extra-high voltage to the grid and helps to maintain grid stability in a region with an already very elevated share of renewables in the system.

The solar plant’s 3,500 inverters are equipped with additional software to supply reactive power, which the TSO can draw on to stabilise voltage levels if needed.

"In the early months of this year, renewables covered around 75% of electricity demand in eastern Germany and Hamburg [50Hertz’s coverage area],” 50Hertz CEO Stefan Kapferer said.

“The Witznitz Energy Park has already contributed to this, showing that the expansion of solar power is now moving to a whole new level.

“By activating reactive power and incorporating the solar plant into our congestion management, we're once again doing pioneering work to make as much electricity from renewable energies usable as the grid will allow."

For electricity to reach the consumer, reactive power is needed as well as actual active power, the TSO explained. It acts like a lubricant for transmission and is deployed to regulate individual grid sections depending on regional feed-in and offtake scenarios.

Move On has built the huge solar array for Hansainvest Real Asset Management, a unit of insurance group Signal Iduna, on a dumping area of ​​a former brown coal open-cast mine and has an area of ​​500 hectares.

It extends over parts of the communities of Neukieritzsch, Böhlen and Rötha on Hainer See. Around 1.1 million solar modules from Chinese manufacturer Jinko Solar were installed, the company said. The plant operates its own electricity substation to feed the solar power into the high-voltage grid.

Move On partner and technical director Wolfgang Pielmaier said the Witznitz array will generate 0.6TWh of green power per year, sufficient to supply all households of the city of Leipzig with its 620,000 inhabitants with power.