Page 13 - AsiaElec Week 45 2021

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ENERGY SECURITY step that complements the early growth of Entwicklungsgesellschaft Mbh); with some
renewable energy. commercial lenders backed by Multilateral
AIIB approves $100 million implementing plans to meet the projected Investment Guarantee Agency guarantees.
The Government of Uzbekistan is
The project aligns with Uzbekistan’s
loan to promote energy electricity demand and the long-term national strategy and forms part of the
objective of ensuring reliable and efficient
Strategy of Action for the Five Priority
supply and security in electricity supply while facilitating low-carbon Development Areas of Uzbekistan
transition toward carbon neutrality by 2050.
(2017-2021). Uzbekistan’s Carbon
Uzbekistan The project is also in line with Uzbekistan’s Neutrality Roadmap by 2050 also includes
modernisation of gas power plants. It will
Nationally Determined Contribution, which
The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank aims to decrease specific greenhouse gas contribute to the modernisation of critical
(AIIB) has approved a $100mn loan to emissions per unit of GDP by 10 percent by energy infrastructure in the Sirdarya region
ACWA Power Sirdarya LLC to support the 2030 from 2010 levels. through a private-public partnership model
construction of the Sirdarya 1,500 MW The project is AIIB’s largest NSBF and will result in an efficient and reliable form
Combined Cycle Gas Turbines (CCGT) Power project in Central Asia and is the first of baseload generation installed capacity while
Project in Uzbekistan. large-scale independent power producer contributing to more efficient use of domestic
The project, AIIB’s first non-sovereign- project in Uzbekistan to date, a product of gas in the country.
backed financing (NSBF) in Uzbekistan, aims the long reform and liberalisation process AIIB
to increase the availability of high efficiency of Uzbekistan’s energy sector. The project
gas power generation capacity in the country. is being developed by ACWA Power, a
Uzbekistan’s electricity system faces major developer, investor and operator of power, TRANSITION
supply gaps (estimated to be 9.4 percent of desalinated water, and green hydrogen plants
the total electricity demand in 2019) and in the Middle East, Africa, Central Asia and Philippines, Indonesia
lacks the needed reserve capacity to balance Southeast Asia.
the upcoming large share of intermittent Along with AIIB, the other participating sign Energy Transition
renewable energy such as solar and wind. The lenders are European Bank for
construction of new, high-efficiency gas power Reconstruction and Development, OPEC Mechanism
stations, which would replace older and less Fund for International Development
efficient assets, is an important modernisation and DEG (Deutsche Investitions- Und The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and

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