Mott MacDonald will act as owner’s engineer on the 258 MW Sakuto solar photovoltaic (PV) power plant in Japan, the engineering firm has announced.
Project developer Pacifico has appointed the UK-based company to supervise construction of the solar farm, the largest PV scheme in the country.
Japan established a favourable feed-in tariff for solar PV in 2012 to promote the development and exploitation of renewable energy resources within the country. Energy from Sakuto, located in Mimasaka-shi, will be sold to the Chugoku Electric Power Company for 20 years.
Construction of Sakuto started in April 2017, according to Pacifico. Mott MacDonald will be on-site full-time to supervise the civil, electrical, structural and instrumentation system implementation work. It will also review all document submissions and detailed plant designs according to local codes and international practice for solar PV projects.
“Sakuto fits in with Japan’s broader strategy to reduce dependency on nuclear power,” said Philip Napier-Moore, Mott MacDonald’s project director. “It also will help the government meet its ambitious capacity targets to provide 64 GW of solar PV electricity, both rooftop and ground-mounted, by 2030.”
Commercial operation of Sakuto is planned for late 2019.
