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US power company ContourGlobal has given Wärtsilä a turnkey contract to supply a 100MW power plant for the capital Lomé (AE 105/3). The project, Togo’s largest ever electricity investment, has attracted $209m in financing and political risk insurance from the US’ official Overseas Private Investment Corporation (Opic).

Operator Noble Energy has made an oil discovery with the Carla South exploration well in Block I. Partner PA Resources said the well had reached a total measured depth of 3,660 metres, encountering ten metres vertical thickness of net oil pay in good quality sandstones at the target level. Following completion of logging operations, the well is being side-tracked to an adjacent target.

Eni will import less gas from Algeria this year and next as part of an ongoing renegotiation of its long-term agreement with Sonatrach. On 28 May, Eni said the two companies “had agreed on a package solution for 2013 and 2014 within the framework of their commercial discussions under the existing gas contract” and that they would “reduce certain quantities of the contractual gas volumes delivered into Italy”. According to Eni’s 2012 annual report, the company imported 14.45bcm of gas from Algeria in 2012 via pipeline and liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipments.

Five more projects have broken ground in recent weeks, including two of the largest wind farms approved so far under the renewable energy independent power producers (REIPP) procurement programme. News flow from first-round developers beginning construction on their projects forms a positive backdrop as the Department of Energy and second-round developers gear up to meet financial close next month.

The African Development Bank board has approved a $144.9m loan for the Kenya-Tanzania Power Interconnection Project. The project involves the construction of a 508km, 400kV overhead double-circuit transmission line from Isinya substation in Kenya to Singida substation in Tanzania, as well as 400kV substations at Iringa, Dodoma, Singida, Shinyanga and Arusha in Tanzania. The line will transmit up to 2,000MW. A tender for the supervision and management of the project was issued last month.

On 1 May, the World Bank board was due to consider two sets of partial risk guarantees (PRGs) for Nigerian power projects, one from the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (Miga) and the other from the World Bank directly. Miga is proposing guarantees worth $658m for the 459MW Azura Power West Africa independent power producer (IPP) project, an open cycle gas turbine plant that Miga told African Energy was expected to close before 30 June. The package forms part of a wider programme by Miga promising more than $1bn worth of guarantees to infrastructure projects in Nigeria.

Citadel Capital’s upstream oil and gas arm, National Petroleum Company (NPC), has increased production from the Shukheir Bay field, 125km north of Hurghada on the western coast of the Red Sea, by 1,700 b/d

France’s Technip has been awarded a lump-sum contract by Noble Energy to develop the Aseng field, located in Block I offshore Equatorial Guinea, at a water depth of approximately 1,000 metres. Technip, which is listed on Paris’ Euronext market, will carry out engineering, supply, installation and pre-commissioning of the 30km flexible pipe system, including risers, flowlines and jumpers.

Controversial South African businessman Moto Mabanga has failed in his bid to win more money from Ophir Energy for helping the company to secure acreage offshore Tanzania

African Petroleum says it is preparing to launch a formal arbitration process in its dispute with the government over blocks A1 and A4. Government officials say the licences expired in September 2016 and have not been renewed, but African Petroleum says the formal termination procedure has not been followed. In April, the Oslo-listed company said it had agreed heads of terms for an unnamed company to take a 70% stake in the Gambian blocks and its Senegal licence, but in July it said it had allowed the exclusivity agreement to lapse “to provide flexibility in government discussions” over the Gambia blocks, and to enable it to talk to other potential suitors for Senegal.

Fighting has continued to threaten oilfield security in South Sudan’s main oil producing states of Unity and Upper Nile in recent weeks, but production has remained more or less steady at about 165,000 b/d, according to oil industry sources. Government oil sales, meanwhile, have increased by 1m barrels a month. The government closed a tender on 7 May for the sale of 3.8m barrels of Dar Blend crude from Upper Nile. Four contracts were awarded: one of 600,000 barrels and three of 1m barrels. The 600,000-barrel contract was won by Glencore.

The World Bank’s decision not to provide guarantees to the high-profile scheme as currently configured has led to recriminations from developers and the Kenyan establishment, but the project may survive in amended form

Still in expansion mode despite the global downturn, Italy’s Eni has returned to Gabon, acquiring six new exploration licences covering more than 8,000km2 offshore and onshore.

Cairn Energy has submitted a three-year evaluation work plan to the government of Senegal and selected the Ocean Rig Athena drillship for an initial programme of three firm and three optional exploration and appraisal wells, with drilling starting in Q4 2015.Cairn estimates that last year’s SNE-1 and FAN-1 oil discoveries and the currently identified prospects and leads have an estimated mean risked resource base of more than 1bn barrels. The Ocean Rig Athena is drilling the Vali-1 well for ConocoPhillips in Angola’s Kwanza Basin, which spudded in April.

Uganda Electricity Generation Company has awarded ILF Consulting Engineers a contract to provide design and consultancy services for the 44MW Muzizi hydroelectric power plant. The Munich and Innsbruck-based consultancy will review the feasibility study and optimise the design before drawing up tender documents and assisting with procurement. The company will later act as implementation engineer and supervise construction. Muzizi will be a run-of-river plant on the Muzizi River in western Uganda with a 450-metre head and 12m3/sec discharge. It is being financed by the Agence Française de Développement and German development agency KfW.