Securum Equity signs $2.3 bn solar deal for Serbia

SARAJEVO, SERBIA: Luxembourg-based Securum Equity Partners said it has signed a 1.75 billion euro ($2.32 billion) deal to purchase photo voltaic panels from Italy-based MX Group for its future 1 gigawatt solar park in Serbia.

Ivan Matejak, the head of the company's Serbian unit, said on Thursday the solar park in the south of the Balkan country could be the largest in the world when it is completed in three to five years.

"Electricity generated by the solar park will be exclusively for export," Matejak told Reuters.

Matejak said that some 2,500 to 3,000 workers will be needed to build the solar park that will employ 500 to 600 people when it is connected to the grid.

MX Group may also set up a photo voltaic panels plant in Serbia at a later stage, Matejak added.

Serbia produces 70 percent of its electricity in coal-fired plants and the rest from hydropower.

It urgently needs to upgrade its energy infrastructure, which was damaged and mismanaged during the Balkan wars of the 1990s and improve its energy mix to meet growing demand and reduce future reliance on imports.