• Latest press releases
• Pictures and Videos
• Press Contact
• Register for press mailing list

Sufficient clean power can be generated in the world's sunny deserts to supply humankind with enough electricity on a sustainable basis. DESERTEC is an integrated concept which includes energy security and climate protection as well as drinking water production, socio-economic development, security policy and international cooperation. The concept was originally developed by a network of  politicians, academics and economists around the Mediterranean, from which the DESERTEC Foundation has evolved.

The non-profit DESERTEC Foundation promotes the fast implementation of its concept in all suitable regions of the world. In 2009 the DESERTEC Concept gained a lot of attention when the DESERTEC Foundation founded the industrial initiative Dii GmbH together with partners from the industrial and finance sectors.

For pictures, video clips and animations on Concentrating Solar-thermal Power  plants or High-Voltage Direct Current transmission please ask for example our partners Solar Millennium or ABB.

Suitable deserts worldwide

You can download this map here (1 MB). Please indicate "DESERTEC Foundation, www.desertec.org" as source.

"Within 6 hours deserts receive more energy from the sun than humankind consumes within a year", calculated Dr. Gerhard Knies, German Physicist and member of the Supervisory Board of the DESERTEC Foundation.

DESERTEC in EU-MENA

You can download our full DESERTEC EU-MENA Map here (9 MB). If you use this map, please indicate "DESERTEC Foundation, www.desertec.org" as source.

DESERTEC EU-MENA Map: Sketch of possible infrastructure for a sustainable supply of power to Europe, the Middle East and North Africa (EU-MENA).

The red squares represent the total surfaces needed for solar collectors of Concentrating Solar-thermal Power (CSP) plants to provide the electricity demands

• for the world (18.000 TWh/a, 300x300 km²)
• for Europe (EU 3.200 TWh/a, 125x125 km²) 
• and for Germany or MENA (Middle East and North Africa, about 600 TWh/a, 55x55 km²).
• The square labeled "TRANS-CSP Mix EUMENA 2050" indicates the surface needed for solar collectors to realize DESERTEC in EU-MENA (according to the TRANS-CSP scenario by German Aerospace Center DLR). This way the needs for seawater desalination and about two-thirds of the rising electricity consumption in the MENA region could be provided and about 17 percent of the European electricity consumption in 2050 (2,940 TWh/a, 120x120 km² in total). 

In reality numerous CSP-Plants will be spread in the deserts of EU-MENA and around the globe.