French renewable energy developer and a unit of Axpo Holding, Urbasolar, has commenced the construction of a 30 MW solar photovoltaic plant in the municipality of Pa in Balé province of Burkina Faso.

The facility is developed under a public-private partnership with the local government. It is built on 35 hectares of land area, consists of 25,000 solar panels, and is capable of generating up to 51.7 GWh of energy per year. Once operational, the project will generate energy for the national utility Sonabel at CFA 48 (US$0.081)/kWh. 

The project represents a total investment of about US$33 million. Urbasolar secured the funds for the development of the project via a financial pool from Proparco, a subsidiary of the French Development Agency (AFD) group, as well as the West African Development Bank.