Saint-Benoît is a 17 MW solar power plant in Reunion, France. Based on its capacity (estimated), it can supply roughly 7.3k homes (estimated). It ranks #394 of 2,216 France power plants by installed capacity. As a non-combustion source, it has no direct CO₂ emissions from generation. In context, solar supplies about 5.6% of France's electricity; the national grid averages 41 gCO₂/kWh (94.9% low-carbon) (2025).
Plant data: WRI Global Power Plant Database (CC BY 4.0), id WRI1024096.
Known, modelled and calculated values are kept separate. Missing fields are shown as unavailable.
The public capacity above is the current source-record value. A 2026 tracker candidate lists 13 MW for Saint-Benoît solar project, but it is not used as the public primary value until scope is verified (unit vs operating vs installed/project total).
Capacity claim grade: A2_MEDIUM_REVIEW - recommended action: manual_source_check - confidence: medium. This follows a claim-based data model: value + scope + source + confidence, rather than silently overwriting records.
The capacity and/or fuel fields on this page include a source-backed provenance label from GEM, an official registry, Wikidata, OSM, or a cross-source match.
capacity: GEM tracker 2026 (location L100000827718); fuel: WRI source-record fuel
At 17 MW, Saint-Benoît is well above the median solar plant in France (3 MW). Solar PV converts sunlight directly into electricity with no moving parts or fuel; output varies by time of day and weather, so it pairs with storage or flexible backup.
Capacity comparison computed from the WRI Global Power Plant Database; fuel-type context is general engineering background.
Installed capacity (MW), WRI Global Power Plant Database (CC BY 4.0).
This solar plant converts sunlight directly into electricity with photovoltaic panels. It sits in a tropical savanna climate (Köppen As) — Southern Hemisphere, latitude 21.0°S — which shapes how much energy it can produce and how its output varies through the year.
Monthly mean temperature
This site has effectively no heating season (tropical/equatorial climate), so winter heat loss is not the driver here. The thermal concern shifts to year-round process heat and humidity/heat-driven corrosion of hot equipment.
Solar PV loses ~0.35%/°C above 25°C cell temperature — roughly 0.0% at warm-season highs here (estimate).
Climate normals: WorldClim 2.1 (1970–2000 monthly normals, 10 arc-min, CC BY 4.0); zone: Köppen-Geiger world climate classification (Kottek et al. 2006, 0.5° grid). Degree-days & heat-demand index computed by PowerAtlas — a modelled heat-demand proxy, not a measured site figure.
For a plant’s outdoor hardware — heat-recovery steam generators (HRSG), expansion joints, valves, flanges and their insulation — the local climate sets how fast unprotected steel and coatings degrade. This site sits in an aggressive, high-corrosion environment (estimated ISO 9223 class C5 — Very high), with marine salt corrosion the leading environmental stress.
Higher environmental severity is exactly where protective removable insulation pays back most: a sheltered micro-climate slows corrosion, UV and thermal-cycling damage and extends outdoor hardware service life. This is an indicative site-climate context — not a condition assessment of any specific plant or operator.
Indicative estimate via the ISO 9223:2012 informative method (atmospheric corrosivity from temperature, time-of-wetness and airborne salinity), using WorldClim climate normals, the Köppen-Geiger class and coast distance. Indicative, not a measured corrosion rate.
The #36 largest solar power plant of 817 in France by capacity.
France has 817 solar power plants in this dataset, together about 5,030 MW of capacity.
Coordinates -21.0377, 55.6852 from WRI Global Power Plant Database (CC BY 4.0). View on OpenStreetMap.
Saint-Benoît is a 17 MW source-record solar power plant in Reunion, France.
Its output is enough to supply roughly 7,275 homes (estimated).
