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AfrElec RENEWABLES AfrElec

Ethiopia signs 500-MW solar

deal with UAE’s Masdar

ETHIOPIA ETHIOPIA and United Arab Emirates renewa- Billene Seyoum, Abiy’s spokesperson, or Mamo
ble energy company Masdar have signed a joint Mihretu, chief executive officer of state-run Ethi-
development agreement (JDA) for a construc- opia Investment Holdings; neither did Masdar
tion of two solar photovoltaic (PV) plants with a immediately respond to a request for comment,
combined generation capacity of 500 megawatts Reuters writes.
(MW). Ethiopia is expanding its energy capacity and
The deal, announced by Ethiopia’s Prime is keen to harness its renewable resources and
Minister Abiy Ahmed on Wednesday (January “ensure access to abundant, clean and affordable
18), could potentially allow Ethiopia to signifi- energy” in line with the global net zero emission
cantly expand its power generating capacity and target, Abiy said in his tweet.
also diversify its energy mix, a key part of Abiy’s Last year, the country began generating
industrialisation drive, Reuters reports. power from its giant Grand Ethiopian Renais-
“Pleased to see the signing of a joint devel- sance Dam (GERD), a multi-billion-dollar
opment agreement (JDA) between the Govern- hydropower plant on the river Nile that neigh-
ment of Ethiopia and Masdar to develop two bours Sudan and Egypt have opposed. When
solar photovoltaic plants,” Abiy said in a tweet, fully operational, the dam will have a generating
adding the two plants would have a combined capacity of more than 6,000MW.
generation capacity of 500MW. Masdar has been pushing into renewable
According to data from the state-run Ethi- energy in Africa and elsewhere, notes Reuters.
opian Electric Power, Ethiopia currently has This week the company also signed an agree-
a total installed energy capacity of about 4,898 ment with Zambia’s state-owned power utility
MW, with 9% of it coming from hydroelectric Zesco to develop solar projects worth $2bn, as
power. Abiy did not give details on where the reported by bneIntellinews.™
plants will be located or the cost to build them.
No further information was provided by
Vinci breaks ground on hydro

project in Senegal

SENEGAL VINCI Construction Grands Projets, a leading development of renewable energy in Senegal.
French builder, has officially broken ground on Vinci is building the damn for the Gambia
the Sambangalou dam in Senegal. River Basin Development Organisation, a mul-
The massive €388mn ($421mn) hydroelec- tinational organization involving Senegal, The
tric project, located near the town of Kédougou Gambia, Guinea, and Guinea-Bissau. Alongside
in the southeast of the country, is due to be com- Vinci, Austrian turbine maker Andritz Hydro
pleted by 2027. The construction is starting more will also work on the project.
than two years after the contract for the project Preparatory work for the project has already
was signed, in December 2020, paid for by gov- been initiated, including the building of access
ernment funds and loans from development roads, the construction of staff houses for the
banks in Europe, Japan, China, and the Middle construction crews, and the erection of the
East. Kédougou Bridge.
The 108-metre-high dam will create a res- Vinci has also agreed to recruit and train
ervoir with around 4bn cubic meters of water, 1,000 local people to work on the scheme and
which will provide a vital source of drinking will build a drinking water treatment station
water and irrigation for 90,000 hectares of alongside the dam. Water will be donated to
land. It will also produce clean energy. The pro- schools.™
ject is seen as a significant step forward in the

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