Page 13 - AfrElec Week 48 2020

AfrElec NEWS IN BRIEF AfrElec

cost Power Authority (BPA). In order for us to take invests $2.1bln
full advantage of it, there will be a research
A Wärtsilä Flexicycle power plant will increase site for those who will operate it to acquire the The Egyptian Electricity Holding Company
Senegal’s energy production and lower the necessary knowledge,” President Nana Addo (EEHC) and its subsidiaries have made total
country’s energy costs. Dankwa Akufo-Addo said at the ceremony. investments amounting to EGP 33bn during
On a broader scale, the thermal plant The inauguration of the power station fiscal year (FY) 2019/20, according to EEHC
will provide needed flexibility to enable the comes one year after it was commissioned. Chairperson Gaber Desouky.
integration of intermittent renewable energy It is a run-of-river power plant, that is to Desouky’s comments came during the
into Senegal’s grid. say, a facility that does not depend on a dam company’s Ordinary General Assembly and
With 450 MW of installed capacity in for its operation. The installation consists Extraordinary General Assembly meetings,
Senegal, Wärtsilä is the country’s leading of a spillway that diverts part of the flow of headed by Minister of Electricity and
provider of power generation equipment. the Tsatsadu River. An intake installed in Renewable Energy Mohamed Shaker.
The Matelec company placed an order for the spillway leads the water to a diversion Desouky said that, thanks to the support
the delivery of an energy efficient 130 MW channel. The water passing through the of Egypt’s political leadership, the EEHC
Flexicycle power plant. diversion channel flows through a 300 mm has succeeded in overcoming the challenges
This investment will enable Senegal diameter steel penstock down a steep slope to it faced during the novel coronavirus
to achieve its goal of reducing consumer a hydroelectric power station built at the foot (COVID-19) pandemic. The company has
electricity pricing. of the hill. With the speed generated by the also managed to stabilise the national grid,
Matelec is the EPC contractor hill, the water turns a turbine that produces 45 bridged the gap between production and
(engineering, procurement, and construction) kW of electricity. demand for electricity, and completed steps to
for the independent power producer (IPP) BPA estimates that the plant’s capacity rehabilitate electricity companies.
Melec PowerGen, with whom Senelec has can be expanded with a new 40- or 60-kW He added that many measures have been
signed a 120 MW power purchase agreement turbine. The $400,000 project was financed taken, the most important of which is the
(PPA). largely by internally generated funds from settlement of financial entanglements between
he 20-year PPA is a direct follow-up to a BPA and a contribution of $80,000 from the holding company and its subsidiary
previous development agreement between the UNDP (United Nations Development companies with the Ministry of Finance
Senelec, the state power utility, and Africa50, Programme) Energy Commission’s Renewable and the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral
the infrastructure fund for Africa, for the Energy Technology Transfer (RETT) Resources.
selection of an IPP to develop a 120 MW project, which received funding from the This has taken place through the
combined cycle thermal power plant. Danish government to cover the purchase of implementation of the Council of Ministers’
“We needed a reliable and qualified partner electromechanical equipment and technical decisions, on the basis of which protocols
to engineer and provide a flexible and reliable support. were signed to resolve the entanglements.
energy system now, and later as our energy Desouky pointed out that the capacity
infrastructure evolves. of Egypt’s national grid increased by 1,199
“With its global and Pan-African megawatts (MW) to 59,529 MW, with the
experience, Wärtsilä fully meets the project INVESTMENT amount of energy generated reaching about
requirements. This is a major energy project 197.3bn kWh.
that is important for Senegal.” – Sami Egypt’s electricity authority
Soughayar, CEO, Matelec Group.
Wärtsilä will engineer, manufacture, and
deliver the Malicounda power project to the
Mbour region, 85 km south of the country’s
capital Dakar.
The plant is expected to become
operational in 2020.

HYDRO

Nana Akufo-Addo
inaugurates 45 kW Tsatsadu

mini-hydro power plant

The Tsatsadu small hydropower plant was
recently inaugurated by the Ghanaian Head
of State Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
The facility operates the Tsatsadu Falls in the
Hohoe District, Volta Region. “The design,
engineering and construction was carried out
(…) by engineers and workers from the Bui

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