Page 15 - AfrElec Week 19

AfrElec
NEWS IN BRIEF
AfrElec
of Directors approved on January 15 the additional funding of for the geothermal exploitation project in the Lake Assal region of Djibouti.
This financing is in addition to the earlier $6.83mn and$ 14.68mn approved by the Bank’s Board of Directors in June 2013 and May 2018 respectively, bringing its total contribution to $24.73mn.
The project for which this additional funding is intended aims to improve the quality of life of the Djiboutian population through the increase of green energy production capacity, the reduction of oil imports, and the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. tight.
Its objective is to explore the geothermal steam field of Lake Assal, located in the center of the country, and to confirm the characteristics of the geothermal resource. In a three-phase programme, exploration of the field in question will first be carried out to confirm the characteristics of the geothermal resource; next will be the development of the geothermal field and the construction of a power plant with a capacity of 20 megawatts (MW); and finally the extension of the capacity of this plant to 50 MW.
This project is also part of a geothermal energy development programme and will help build the first such plant in Djibouti. It will ultimately increase the green energy
production capacity of this country in the Horn of Africa, increase access to electricity, thanks to a more reliable and more efficient source of energy. affordable. It will also reduce Djibouti’s oil imports and greenhouse gas emissions. By improving its access to electrical energy, it will contribute to improving the quality of life of the Djiboutian population.
SOLAR
Zimbabwe power utility woos private solar power producers to supply national grid
Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC) is seeking to boost power supply by tapping into excess power produced by private users of solar energy through a net metering programme.
Under the programme, any existing customer producing solar energy on their premises can feed excess power back into the ZETDC network through a grid-tied inverter. However, the power utility will not pay cash for the power and will credit the customer
with power units instead.
Only electrical power units and not money
shall be credited to the customer account and this will benefit the customer by keeping their bills low as it reduces the total units billed at the end of the month.
Zimbabwe has been grappling with
power shortages for several years now and is currently upgrading its major thermal power station – Hwange Thermal Power Station – with assistance from the Chinese government.
Last May, Zimbabwe was forced to introduce 18-hour daily power cuts and struggled to import electricity from neighbouring countries to plug the shortfall. At the end of March this year, the flows on the Zambezi River recorded in Victoria Falls were 54% above the long-term average and way higher than last year’s flows during the same period. But even with more water, the Zambezi River Authority said it would limit Zimbabwe and Zambia’s electricity generating capacity to 275MW each for now in an effort to ensure build-up of the reservoir storage.
Zimbabwe has installed electricity generating capacity of 1,050MW in Kariba. Power cuts hit the country’s struggling economy hard as companies lost production time while others had to invest in alternative sources of fuel.
Week 19 14•May•2020
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