Syrian Arab News Agency S A N A
Damascus, SANA- The Ministry of Local Administration and Environment has started implementing a number of projects working on solar energy in all provinces to serve industrial cities, pump water, street lighting devices, and citizen service centers.
Director of Environmental Safety Department at the Ministry, Engineer Rowaida al-Nahar, explained in a statement to a representative of SANA that the ministry has started installing 10,735 lighting devices with poles and concrete bases that operate on solar energy, distributed in a number of cities and towns in the provinces and will be put into service by the end of this year.
Al-Nahar indicated to the beginning of implementing the project to supply Jdeidet Yabous border center in Damascus countryside with electric power by generating about 70 kilowatts of photovoltaic energy, and the implementation of solar power generation projects in the industrial cities and a number of city centers, villages and towns, in addition to generating electric power through photovoltaic panels for the benefit of citizen service centers in the provinces whose number is estimated at 31 centers.
According to al-Nahar, there is a plan to install solar panels for about 100 wells, some of which are used for drinking and others for agriculture, in several provinces, and to create irrigation stations for thousands of hectares, from which more than 300,000 farmers would benefit and they will be accomplished by the end of the current year.
She added that over the last period, projects were implemented to pump water from collective wells on solar energy in Maaloula, Sahnayia, Zabadani, Humira, Hala, Ras al-Ain, Ain al-Tineh, al-Nabik and Darbel in Damascus Countryside province and two other wells in al-Kafroun area and Karm al-Tin in Tartous province. These wells irrigate thousands of dunums of agricultural lands.
The Ministry had recently installed more than 7,000 solar-powered lighting devices to illuminate the main streets in the provinces of Damascus, Aleppo, Lattakia, Tartous, Hama, Homs, Daraa, Hasaka and Deir Ezzor, with a total installed capacity of 18,061 kilowatts.
Ruaa al-Jazaeri
