Acwa Power Begins Electricity Generation at Two Saudi Plants

Saudi renewables company Acwa Power has started generating electricity from two major gas-fired power plants under construction. Initial production has begun at the Taiba 1 plant in Medina and Qassim 1 in central Saudi Arabia. Together, the projects represent more than SAR13 billion ($3.5 billion) of investment and will have combined capacity of about 3.8 gigawatts (GW) when fully operational, the company said in a statement to the Saudi stock exchange. Both plants are due to be completed in 2027, and are built to support a blend of up to 50 percent hydrogen with natural gas. Acwa initially said the plants would be fully operational in the second quarter of 2025. The company owns a 40 percent stake each in Sidra One for Electricity Company and Qudra One for Electricity Company, the special-purpose vehicles for the two projects. Other investors include Saudi Energy (formerly Saudi Electricity) and Haji Abdullah Alireza & Company. Last month, the company said net profit fell 36 percent year on year to SAR308 million in the second quarter of 2026 as the US-Iran war slowed project development across the GCC. Despite the geopolitical uncertainty, Acwa added 5.2GW of power generation capacity and 0.6 million cubic metres per day of water desalination capacity to its development pipeline, it said. Acwa has 32 projects under development, accounting for 47GW of power generation capacity and 2 million cubic metres per day of water desalination capacity. The sovereign Public Investment Fund owns 44.1 percent of Acwa Power. The company’s shares were trading 2 percent higher on Thursday morning, but are down more than 6 percent so far this year.