Scatec Secures $217 Million to Build Egypt’s Dandara Solar-Storage Plant

Norwegian renewables developer Scatec has secured $217 million in non-recourse project financing and started construction on the first phase of the Dandara solar-plus-storage plant in Egypt, a facility that will supply electricity to state-owned Egypt Aluminium under a long-term power purchase agreement.

A $271 million first phase, mostly debt-financed

The $217 million package, provided jointly by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the European Investment Bank (EIB), covers roughly 80% of the approximately $271 million cost of Dandara’s Phase 1, according to pv-magazine and energy-pedia. The remainder is being funded through equity contributed by the project’s shareholders. Structuring the debt as non-recourse project financing means repayment is tied to the plant’s own cash flows rather than backed by Scatec’s broader balance sheet, a common approach for utility-scale renewables financed by development banks in emerging markets.

Who owns Dandara

Scatec holds a combined 56% stake in the project — 36% through an EBRD-backed investment platform and 20% directly — while Egypt’s National Bank of Egypt holds 20%, per pv-magazine’s reporting, which was corroborated by energy-pedia. Scatec is also acting as the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor and will operate and maintain the plant once it is running.

Supplying Egypt Aluminium under a sovereign-backed contract

Dandara’s power will go to Egypt Aluminium, the state-owned smelter, under a 25-year power purchase agreement that the company has said was signed in March 2025 and carries a sovereign guarantee. Corporate offtake deals of this kind are increasingly used to underpin renewables financing in Egypt, giving lenders a predictable revenue stream over the life of the debt rather than relying on merchant electricity sales.

Scale and timeline

Phase 1 comprises 569 MW of solar photovoltaic capacity paired with 100 MWh of battery storage, with commercial operation targeted for the first half of 2028. Scatec has said construction of a second phase is planned to begin in the first half of 2027, though financing for that stage has not been disclosed. Once operational, Phase 1 is expected to generate about 1.4 TWh of electricity a year and avoid more than 550,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually — projected figures for when the plant is running, not current output.

Part of a broader buildout in Egypt

Dandara follows Scatec’s 1.1 GW Obelisk solar-plus-storage plant in Egypt, which the company completed in August 2026 and which is roughly double Dandara Phase 1’s capacity. Egypt has set a target of reaching 42% renewables in its power mix by 2030, and storage has become a recurring feature of recent projects in the country — including a separate lithium-ion battery manufacturing plant agreed between Rosatom’s storage unit and Egypt’s Teletech, aimed at supplying the local market with battery cells rather than importing them.

Sources

• pv-magazine.com, Brian Publicover, “Scatec secures $217 million for Egypt smelter solar-plus-storage plant,” 29 October 2026 — https://www.pv-magazine.com/2026/10/29/scatec-secures-217-million-for-egypt-smelter-solar-plus-storage-plant/ (financing amount, ownership structure, capacity, PPA, timeline)
• energy-pedia.com, “Scatec secures financing for the first phase of the Dandara solar and BESS project in Egypt,” 2026 — https://www.energy-pedia.com/news/egypt/scatec-secures-financing-for-the-first-phase-of-the-dandara-solar-and-bess-project-in-egypt-205865 (corroborates financing amount and ownership split)

Illustrative image. Photo: Dietmar Rabich, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons — source