Why the Red Sea solar and battery project never touches the national grid
A tourism development on the Red Sea coast of Saudi Arabia now runs on what its developer calls the largest off grid solar and battery project in the world, after the operating consortium reached full commercial operation, the contractual point at which a project is treated as complete and fully running, on September 6, 2026. The United States Department of Energy calls a system like this a microgrid, a small power system that makes its own electricity and can run separately from a larger regional grid, a state the department calls islanding. This system does not just island when the wider grid fails. It never connects to the Saudi national grid at all, so its own solar panels and batteries have to hold power steady on their own, every hour of every day. Acwa Power, the lead developer, says the finished system pairs 340 megawatts of solar power with 1,227 megawatt hours of battery storage, a figure independently confirmed by PV Tech, a 2nd energy trade publication, which the company calls the largest off grid battery facility built anywhere.
The system sits at what Guinness World Records, the record keeper, calls Red Sea New City, in Tabuk Province, and it runs the hotels, airport, staff housing, electric vehicle charging, desalination, wastewater treatment and the shared cooling network of the tourism development, with no backup from the national grid. Desalination across 3 reverse osmosis plants, which force seawater through a fine filter to remove the salt, reaches 32,500 cubic meters a day. The shared cooling network, which cools many buildings from 1 central plant instead of each building running its own air conditioner, reaches 32,500 refrigeration tons of capacity, and wastewater treatment reaches 16,000 cubic meters a day.
What the system cost, and who is paying for it
Acwa Power reports total investment of about 1.84 billion dollars, financed partly through about 1.33 billion dollars in senior debt, a loan that lenders get repaid from first if the project runs into trouble, with financial close, the date the financing was finally locked in, reached in February 2022. Subtracting the debt from the total leaves about 0.51 billion dollars financed some other way, a gap the press release itself does not break out, a calculation made for this article from the 2 figures the company does state directly.
The other financing bar is a calculation made for this article, total investment minus senior debt, not a figure Acwa Power states directly.
Show the numbers
| Total investment | 1.84 |
| Senior debt | 1.33 |
| Other financing | 0.51 |
As the world's largest integrated off grid utilities system, and the first of its kind at this scale, the project sets a new global benchmark for sustainable development.
Mohammad Abunayyan, founder and chairman of Acwa Power. Source 2.
A battery that already held a world record before it was finished
Guinness World Records certified this same battery bank on May 20, 2025, at 1,125.18 megawatt hours, an earlier and smaller state of the facility, not a competing count of what it holds today. The battery grew after it already held the record, reaching the 1,227 megawatt hour figure Acwa Power and a 2nd outlet confirm at full commercial operation.
Construction began in October 2021, and the battery itself started operating in September 2023, about 1.9 years later. The Guinness certification followed about 3.6 years after construction began, and full commercial operation followed about 4.9 years after it, both calculated here from the dates the sources state. Acwa Power also reports 30 million working hours during construction with no lost time injury.
All 3 figures are elapsed time calculated for this article from dates in sources 1, 2 and 4, not durations any source states directly.
Show the numbers
| Storage online | 1.9 |
| Record certified | 3.6 |
| Full operation | 4.9 |
Part of a national push toward solar power in Saudi Arabia
The project runs for a 25 year concession, and Acwa Power expects it to deliver up to 760,000 megawatt hours of clean electricity a year, avoiding about 600,000 tons of carbon dioxide annually at full capacity. PV Tech reports Saudi Arabia targets around 100 gigawatts of solar power in operation by 2030, up from 5 to 7 gigawatts of all renewable capacity in operation earlier in 2026, the scale the Red Sea project is meant to help close.
This milestone brings our vision for a new model of regenerative tourism to life at full scale.
John Pagano, group chief executive of Red Sea Global. Source 2.