Search results

Equinor has written down the book value of its Tanzania LNG project by $982m, amid questions over future global LNG demand and continued concerns about Tanzania’s business environment. Equinor’s partner ExxonMobil has been seeking a buyer for its stake for some time. Equinor said that, while progress had been made in recent years on the commercial framework, overall project economics had not yet improved sufficiently to justify keeping it on the balance sheet at its previous value. 

Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited (Tanesco) is seeking an engineering consultant to assist with construction of the 49.5MW Malagarasi hydropower plant in Kigoma region,  western Tanzania. Expressions of interest are invited by 16 February. The scope of work includes design review and preparation of bidding documents and support in procuring contractors for plant design, supply and installation.

Tanzania Electric Supply Company (Tanesco) announced on 9 December that it has signed power purchase agreements with six small IPPs. The projects include the 10MW Kahama and 5MW Kigoma solar projects and the 0.36MW Ijangala Falls, 0.9MW Luponde, 1.7MW Madope and 1.2MW Maguta hydropower projects. The agreements give the IPPs 18 months to begin commercial operations.

Nigeria is proving to be a testing ground for trucking gas on African roads, while Circle Gas’s LPG-based cooking solution is building up a consumer base in Kenya and Tanzania. Africa remains a frontier market for ‘virtual pipelines’ and other innovative uses for gas, but business models are evolving to create some vibrant new industries, writes Jon Marks.

Mini-grid company CrossBoundary Energy Access (CBEA) has published a white paper on its model for developing mini-grids in developing countries and will release term sheets and its template project finance model on 15 February 2021. The unusual move comes as mini-grid developers focused on rural electrification continue to face challenges with profitability and attracting investment.

Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited (Tanesco) is set to launch a tender for an EPC contractor for the 50MW Malagarasi hydropower project in the western region of Kigoma after securing financing from the African Development Bank (AfDB).

While Tullow Oil has completed the $575m sale of its Uganda assets to operator Total, removing one barrier to a final investment decision (FID), development of the Lake Albert oil project is likely to take some time. With the year-end fast approaching, Ugandan energy minister Mary Goretti now says she expects FID in H1 2021, though Total had previously talked of a target of end-2020.

The African Development Bank (AfDB) board on 26 November approved a $120m loan to fund the construction of the 50MW Malagarasi hydropower plant in the Kigoma region of western Tanzania. The project includes a run-of-river hydropower plant, a 54km, 132kV transmission line to connect to the national grid, distribution network expansion including rural electrification and last-mile connections, project management and contract administration support, and compensation and resettlement of affected persons.

Participants at an Africa Investment Exchange panel on strategies for regional integration and transmission investment on 27 October provided an update on the progress of the Eastern Africa Power Pool (EAPP), where the secretariat has been busy preparing for electricity trading and a growing network of interconnections. By far the most advanced construction work is on interconnectors between Kenya, Ethiopia and Tanzania, which are expected to transmit their first power between April and June next year.

Energy investors are pushing for Tanzania’s President John Magufuli to deliver on his promise to back competitive energy projects in his second term. Renewable energy plants in particular have potential to move forward if the government is willing to compromise, writes Dan Marks.

The government has approved the farmout of a 50% interest in the Ruvuma production-sharing agreement after Aminex warned that the buyer was set to walk away. Aminex, which first announced the farmout to ARA Petroleum Tanzania Limited in 2018, said on 30 September that, if government approval was not received by 15 October, the deadline would not be extended again.

Chair of the US House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights and International Organisations, Democrat senator Karen Bass, and Republican ranking member Christopher Smith last month introduced a resolution to the House of Representatives (HoR) calling for free and fair elections in Tanzania. If passed, the resolution would give the US administration the legal basis to impose economic and other sanctions on the country.

Upstream operator Total has signed a host government agreement (HGA) with Uganda for its proposed oil export pipeline project connecting Uganda’s oil fields to Tanzania’s Tanga port. “We have today reached major milestones which pave the way to the final investment decision [FID] in the coming months.

GuarantCo, part of the Private Infrastructure Development Group (PIDG), announced on 7 September that it has provided Tanzania’s largest bank, CRDB Bank, with a five-year shilling- denominated portfolio guarantee worth $50m.The guarantee is intended to help the bank to lend to infrastructure projects in the country.

The African Union Commission has received 17 expressions of interest (EoIs) for the Geothermal Risk Mitigation Facility’s sixth application round. The EoIs, for projects in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya,Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, consisted of ten surface studies and seven drilling programmes, and were submitted by both private and public entities. Bid opening took place on 3 August.