The project aims to cover 15% of Europe's electricity needs by 2050 by importing renewable energy, primarily solar power via a high voltage cable. It utilises concentrating solar thermal power (CSP), which collects sunlight via mirrors to produce steam, which then drives turbines to generate electricity.
Paul van Son, chief executive of the Desertec Industrial Initiative (DII), told journalists last week that many companies had expressed an interest in joining the consortium of 12 companies that was established in July 2009 to devise financing plans for the project.
The joint venture is currently dominated by German companies, including E.ON, RWE and Siemens. The group of 12 companies already has one Algerian member, Cevital, but the arrival of other Northern African companies is expected to win support for the project in the region.
"With the new partners we'll have a broader base. That's important for acceptance. It's important that we have companies involved from MENA countries (Middle East and North Africa)," said Van Son, according to Reuters.
He said the €400 billion long-term plan would start delivering within a decade with its first projects.
One of the first goals for the next three years is to get early reference projects up and running, said Alexander Mohanty, spokesperson for the Desertec Industrial Initiative (DII). Although the timescale for completion spans four decades, construction should start before 2020 with smaller projects to show that the project will work in practice, he explained.
The initiative is now finding locations for early projects, Mohanty added, citing Morocco as a potential host.
Another crucial issue the partnership is working on is securing a beneficial legal framework that stimulates investment in North African countries, the spokesperson said. He added that this could take the form of feed-in tariffs.
Feed-in tariffs have been stimulating growth of solar and wind markets in Germany since the country's Renewable Energy Act (EEG) entered into force in 2000, and the model has since been adopted by over 40 countries. As solar energy remains more expensive than fossil fuels, such price incentives are key to attracting investment and accelerating technological development.
But there are currently no provisions on imported clean electricity to guarantee that the electricity generated by Desertec is bought at a certain price over a long period of time.
"If we don't get this investment feasible, the whole project won't work," Mohanty said. How feed-in tariffs would work when several countries are involved is one of the main issues that the consortium is working on, he added.