On October 29, 2026, Masdar officially launched the construction of a 200 MW Chereh Dam floating photovoltaic project in Pahang, Malaysia, making it one of the largest facilities of its kind in Southeast Asia.

580 million Malaysian Ringgit financing confirmed, floating photovoltaic officially starts construction

The project is led by Chereh Solar and the EPC contractor is Citagllobal Berhad. The total financing of approximately 580 million Malaysian Ringgit was completed on October 27, 2026, with funding support from three international lending institutions coordinated by TIZA Global. The project was selected for Malaysia's large-scale solar LSS 5+program through competitive bidding, and it is also the first landing project of the 10GW renewable energy development roadmap reached between Masdar and the Malaysian Investment and Development Authority in 2023.

All the electricity generated by the project will be sold to Tenaga Nasional Berhad, the Malaysian national utility company. The two parties have signed a 21 year power purchase agreement in December 2025, with long-term benefits fully locked in. Masdar will directly introduce the mature technical experience accumulated from building the 145MW Cirata floating photovoltaic project in Indonesia into this project, reducing technical risks during the construction and operation phases.

The pace of floating photovoltaic development in Southeast Asia continues to accelerate

The Chereh project is expected to achieve commercial operation by 2028, and after completion, it can meet the clean electricity needs of about 100000 households. The construction phase will create about 1500 local job opportunities. The groundbreaking ceremony of the project was attended by the Sultan of Pahang, marking the official entry of Malaysia's floating photovoltaic development into the large-scale landing stage. Currently, Masdar is advancing the feasibility study of another floating photovoltaic project in Murum Reservoir, Sarawak, with the regional layout continuing to expand. Floating photovoltaics, new energy

Malaysia has set a development goal of increasing the proportion of renewable energy installed capacity to 35% by 2030. Floating photovoltaics, with the advantages of not occupying arable land and improving power generation efficiency through natural cooling of water bodies, have become the fastest-growing photovoltaic sub track in the Asia Pacific region. Recently, Indonesia and Thailand have successively announced multiple large-scale floating photovoltaic projects, and India has also launched a pilot project of 300kWp membrane based floating photovoltaic technology. The enthusiasm for water-based photovoltaic development in the entire region continues to rise.Editor/Cheng Liting