Leading industry giants Acwa Power, the renewable energy units of European utilities Electricite de France and Enel and Engie’s International Power are the main bidders for Saudi Arabia's first wind-power project, reported Bloomberg, citing the Energy Ministry’s Renewable Energy Project Development Office's notice.

Saudi Arabia said it had received four bids for the 400-MW project it tendered to international companies, without revealing information about the offers.

The world’s biggest oil exporter is planning to develop 9.5 gigawatts of renewable energy by 2023 in an initial push to reduce its reliance on crude and natural gas.

The wind plant, to be located at Dumat Al Janda city in Saudi Arabia’s northwest, will be the first of its kind under the national programme, stated the report.

The northwest, which the government is seeking to develop, has some of the most favourable winds in the kingdom for producing power, it added.

The Saudi Energy Ministry delayed a ceremony planned for Tuesday to open the bid envelopes, according to the notice. The ministry said it will announce a new date shortly, without saying why the ceremony was delayed, stated the Bloomberg report.

State-owned Saudi Arabian Oil Company started a wind turbine at one of its industrial sites in the region in January 2017, the nation’s first such facility, said the report.

In February, Saudi Arabia had awarded its first international tender, with Acwa Power winning the contest to build a 300-megawatt solar plant at Sakaka in the same region.

The kingdom had last month inked a deal with Japan’s SoftBank Group to develop 200 gigawatts of solar power capacity in the desert kingdom by 2030, it added.