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US President Barack Obama’s visit to Nairobi was gilded by the signing of some major renewables agreements. The biggest numbers – $2.2bn – were affixed to the signing at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit of an agreement to develop solar projects with combined capacity of 1GW between Canada-based SkyPower, which is majority owned by US-based urban real estate and infrastructure investment firm CIM Group, and the Kenyan Ministry of Energy. The deal is structured in four phases to be rolled out over the next five years.

Italy’s Eni has announced a new oil discovery on the Kalimba prospect in Block 15/06, estimated to contain 230m-300m barrels of light oil in place. The Kalimba-1 NFW well was drilled by the West Gemini drillship at a site 150km offshore and 50km south-east of the Armada Olombendo floating production, storage and offloading vessel on the block’s East Hub. Drilled in a water depth of 458 metres, the well reached a total depth of 1,901 metres and encountered 23 metres of 33° API oil pay in Upper Miocene sandstones.

The French Development Agency seeks expressions of interest by 11 November for feasibility studies for two 40MWp solar PV projects in Nampula and Niassa provinces. The project sites are being selected and secured by Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM), with technical assistance from the European-funded Project for Promotion of Auctions for Renewable Energies (Proler). Each site is between 120ha and 150ha and the sites are less than 6km from their respective substations.

The government has approved a new exploration and production-sharing contract (PSC) for Block C18, signed with Tullow Oil on 17 May

TGS has announced completion of its Jaan 3D seismic survey collating over 28,000km2 of data in the MSGBC Basin offshore Senegal, Gambia and Guinea-Bissau. Jaan (the Wolof word for snake) is a long strip of seismic coverage consisting of more than 12,000km2 of new data plus recently reprocessed surveys designed to map the Cretaceous Palaeo shelf-edge trend in an area that has seen a number of recent discoveries.

Some 70,000 fuel industry workers went on strike on 11 July, demanding a

There is now hope for economic and military stability in both countries, but ongoing disputes over border issues and the status of Sudapet could still thwart co-operation, writes Hugh Boylan.

The National Oil, Gas and Biofuels Agency (ANPG) has announced the postponement of an information session for Angolan oil companies on the 2020 licensing round that was scheduled to take place on 25 March. The postponement is in line with government measures to control the spread of Covid-19, which discourage public gatherings of more than 200 people.

The late October Algeria Future Energy Summit, held in Algiers, provided the platform for Sonatrach chairman and chief executive (PDG) Abdelmoumen Ould Kaddour to register his control over the hydrocarbons sector and the national company’s closer relations with international oil companies (IOCs) – and notably with European giants, several of whom have been discouraged by Algiers’ stingy terms and faltering policy implementation over the past decade. Ould Kaddour signalled returning confidence in Algeria’s hydrocarbons sector by signing eye-catching upstream agreements, including a deal that could push ahead controversial shale development plans and offshore exploration.

UK-based developer Globeleq announced on 3 June that the 40MWac (52MWp) Malindi solar photovoltaic project at Langobaya in Malindi district has reached financial close. India’s Sterling and Wilson is the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor for the plant, which is expected online in mid-2020.Globeleq acquired 90% of the project in 2017, with the remaining 10% held by the original developer Africa Energy Development Corporation, whose partner Investment and Development of East Africa Power Group (Idea Power) sold its stake at financial close.

The Communauté Electrique du Bénin (CEB) and Compagnie Energie Electrique du Togo (CEET) are seeking bids for a transmission line between Mango and Dapaong in northern Togo and associated medium and low-tension distribution networks. The project is funded with a $46m loan from the Islamic Development Bank. The aim is to improve supply to northern Togo by extending CEB’s 161kV grid from Dapaong to Mango, interconnecting Dapaong with the CEB network in neighbouring Benin at Porga and improving living conditions for rural communities.

Adding a further layer of complexity to Eskom’s finances is a ruling by High Court judge Cynthia Pretorius on 16 August in a judicial review of the decision by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) on 1 March 2016 to let the utility recoup a regulatory clearing account (RCA) balance of R11.2bn ($781m) through a tariff increase of 9.4% for standard customers in 2016-17. The RCA is a mechanism to reduce the risk of Eskom generating either excessive or inadequate returns as a result of unexpected costs or changes in the macroeconomic environment.

A series of petty disputes involving tribes and militias in western Libya have threatened National Oil Corporation (NOC)’s ambitions to maintain or even increase oil output, which peaked at 1.1m b/d in early August. The challenge facing chairman Mustafa Sanalla is that armed groups who have carried out blockades and actions against oil and gas facilities in recent months are outside the control of any single authority.

Following management changes and an upturn in its financing, Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM) was “redefined” as a more commercial and efficient organisation in 2016, the state utility’s chairman and chief executive Mateus Magala told the Africa Energy Forum (AEF) on 7 June. EDM has added 350MW generation capacity in the last two years, according to board member Carlos Youm – and expects to add 950MW in the next five years, providing the government approves further reforms, including cost-reflective tariffs. With the utility on a firmer footing, it will take “two years to establish the new normal”, Magala said.

Total South Africa has signed an agreement to sell LNG produced by South Africa’s Renergen through its service stations. Johannesburg-based Renergen is building South Africa’s first commercial LNG plant, with an expected start-up date in Q3 2021. Announcing the agreement on 18 June, Renergen said the customer base for the LNG will predominantly be logistics companies operating trucks along main routes across South Africa.