ICBC provides a loan for the MINOS 50 MW Photothermal Power Project

Project narrative

On November 11, 2019, under the joint witness of Chinese President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister of Greek Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) signed a syndicated loan agreement with Nur-MOH Heliothermal S.A. — a special purpose vehicle (SPV) — for the MINOS 50 MW Photothermal Power Project. ICBC arranged financing from Chinese, Greek, and regional multilateral financial institutions. Nur-MOH Heliothermal S.A. is a SPV and 50:50 joint venture between United Kingdom-based solar energy developer, Nur Energie Ltd., and Motor Oil (Hellas), Corinth Refineries S.A. one of Greece's leading energy companies. In addition to the ICBC-led financing, in December 2012, the European Commission's NER 300 programme provided a €42 million EUR grant for the MINOS 50 MW Photothermal Power Project. It also provided an additional tariff of €115 EUR/MWh (on top of the base €268 EUR/MWh under the 25-year Power Purchase Agreement), to be disbursed during the operational years until the end of 2025. The MINOS 50 MW Photothermal Power Project had a total investment of about €290 million EUR (~$300 million USD). This project sought to construct a 50 MWe concentrated solar power (CSP) plant on a 160-hectare site with molten salt storage on the island of Crete, in the southeastern coastal area of Atherinolakos in Sitia Municipality adjacent to the industrial zone of the 200 MWe Atherinolakos conventional power station. The molten salt heat storage system had an installed capacity of five hours and the location's solar resources was 2150 kWh per square per year at a long-term Direct Normal Irradiance (DNI) average. The designed annual production of MINOS was 120 GWh. The designed reflective area consumed 385,000 square meters of space and the tower was designed to be 200 meters tall. MINOS is an acronym representing 'Minimum Intermittency Operating System'. The plant was expected to provide 10% of Crete's energy demand, at a much cleaner and ecologically beneficial manner than Crete's existing diesel power stations. The MINOS station was expected to displace 118 GWh of oil-based power annually and conserve at least 30,000 tons of oil consumption generation. Construction was expected to provide 500 jobs to the area and 50-long term jobs over the planned 25-year operation period. This was the first CSP project constructed in Greece, and the first greenfield project in the energy sector done by a Chinese company in Greece. This project was included on the “China-Greece Three-year Cooperation Plan” and “China-UK Cooperation Agreement in Third-party Market" lists. This project was described as a product of the "17+1 cooperation" mechanism between China and Central and Eastern European Countries (CEEC) and significant momentum builder for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). It was also praised as an example of Greek-Chinese-British collaboration along BRI. Nur Energie was the developer of the MINOS 50 MW Photothermal Power Project. Nur Energie obtained the electricity license in 2011. On November 10, 2019, China Energy's China Gezhouba Group International Engineering Co., Ltd. and Zhejiang Supcon Solar Technology Co., Ltd. (now known as Cosin Solar Technology Co., Ltd.) signed the engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contract with Nur-Moh Heliothermal S.A for the project.. Supcon Solar and China Gezhouba Group International Engineering had signed an EPC framework contract on January 31, 2019. Supcon Solar's molten salt tower CSP technology was to be used in the project. Greek company Prenecon S.A. participated in the construction. ESE Engineering Services for Energy S.r.l. served as the owner's engineer. VIER S.T.A. received a contract to erect a 37.5-meter steel structure, solar receiver, steam drum, deaerator, air-cooled condenser, and a steam turbine with a generator and 60 heliostats; it finished its work in February 2020. The expected construction period was 30 months. Construction began sometime in 2019. During 2019, the tower was constructed. The first power generations tests at MINOS were held on December 27, 2019. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic and Greek government restrictions, the MINOS plant was not operated in 2020.