Page 12 - AfrElec Week 12 2021

AfrElec GAS-FIRED GENERATION AfrElec

Egypt’s EGAS announces $377.7mn

development pipeline

EGYPT EGYPTIAN Natural Gas Holding Company companies in the first half (July December)
(EGAS) plans to sign three new natural gas FY2020/2021.
development agreements worth $377.7mn in During the current fiscal year, EGAS signed
fiscal year FY2021/2022 to help push the North nine natural gas exploration agreements with
African country’s annual natural gas production local and foreign partners with total planned
rate to 7.2bn cubic feet (204mn cubic metres) of investments of $981mn to sink 18 wells. Moreo-
gas per day and 100,000 barrels of condensate, ver, the company conducted 3-D seismic studies
the company said in a press release following its covering an area of 18 square km in the western
AGM. Mediterranean.
EGAS plans to install the infrastructure to EGAS was also on target to deliver natural
supply natural gas to 1,500 villages as part of a gas supplies to 1.2mn residential units to bring
rural development plan. up the total number of households being served
The company is also in the process of com- with natural gas since 2013 to 6.5mn in the first
pleting the installation of infrastructure to sup- half of FY2020/2021.
ply natural gas to two of Egypt’s newest cities, Egypt has made its ample supplies of natural
the New Administrative Capital and El Alamein gas the cornerstone for its national energy strat-
City. egy. The vast majority of domestic natural gas
During the meeting EGAS reportedly show- consumption is divided between the electricity
cased the implementation details of three pro- sector and the industrial sector accounting for
jects for developing the natural gas fields of 57.6% and 23.5% of the total respectively, with
the Pharaonic petroleum, Balayim Petroleum the remainder being accounted for by the resi-
(Petrobel) and Disouq Petroleum (Petro Disouq) dential, car fuel and petrochemicals sectors. ™

BIOFUELS

Mombasa refinery could be

revived with biofuels plan

KENYA PLANS are in motion to revive the dormant recovery, regeneration and re-use of agricul-
Kenya Petroleum Refineries Ltd (KPRL) facil- tural and food waste produced in the country.
ity at Changamwe, Mombasa, with Italy’s Eni in The industrial transformation of waste would
talks to convert the unit to process biofuels. enhance its contribution to power generation in
The refinery was transformed into a storage partial replacement of fossil sources, making a
terminal in 2013 after ceasing refining opera- decisive contribution to the country’s decarbon-
tions and most recently acted as a storage facility isation process,”
for crude oil produced under the Early Oil Pilot Central to this would be the conversion of the
Scheme (EOPS) at the country’s South Lokichar KPRL plant, which was the region’s only refinery.
oilfields, which was halted in mid-2020. The closure of the 35,000 barrel per day (bpd)
Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi last week met unit followed the withdrawal of foreign partner
with Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta to dis- Essar Oil of India,which had deemed a promised
cuss various green initiatives with a broad aim upgrade and expansion project uneconomic.
of increasing energy security in an “efficient and This followed heavily indebted KPRL being una-
sustainable” manner. ble to finance further crude oil purchases.
Talks focused on a multi-year initiative to col- Nairobi opted to convert the site into a storage
lect and process waste and agricultural residues facility and allowed Kenya Pipeline Co. (KPC) to
in biofuel plants to produce fuels including bio- lease the assets for a three-year term, scheduled
diesel, bio-jet and bioethanol by using circular to expire in March 2020. KPC operates existing
economy methods. fuel tanks with capacity of 320mn litres at the
In a statement following the meeting, Eni port of Mombasa.
said: “The parties discussed the development KPRL’s facilities comprise 45 tanks with total
of circular economy initiatives, including the capacity of 484mn litres, including 254mn litres

P12 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 12 25•March•2021