Search results

Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn inaugurated the 51MW Adama One wind power project on 1 December. The power project has 34 wind turbines, each with the ability to generate 1.5MW. Some 85% of the $117m cost of the project was covered by a loan from the Export-Import Bank of China, and the remainder by the Ethiopian government.

After the Ethiopian government cancelled its Ogaden Basin oil and gas exploration licences earlier this year, Hong-Kong based PetroTrans is switching to ethanol production. PetroTrans manager for biofuels Negi Glyesus Medape told African Energy that the company was investing $20m in a project to produce 20,000 t/yr of ethanol from sweet sorghum stalks, to start up by end-2013.

The African Development Bank signed a $115m loan agreement on 7 December to part-finance the construction of the Eastern Electricity Highway Project linking Ethiopia and Kenya .

East Africa player Africa Oil Corporation has announced a private placement of up to 25m shares at C$7.75/share to raise C$193.75m. The proceeds will be used to fund the company’s work programme in East Africa and for general working capital purposes.

Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation (EEPCo) has invited bids to supply equipment for the 132kV Gidami, Mendi and Wukro, and 66kV Sekota substations.

Of all the assorted regional infrastructure projects jostling for supremacy in East Africa, the growing credibility of the Lamu Corridor project raises the possibility of a new East African power axis of Kenya and an emergent Ethiopia.

Having been obliged to pull out of Sudan’s Block B because of US sanctions, Marathon Oil is back in East Africa, picking up the 20% stake in Tullow Oil’s South Omo Block held by former England cricketer Philippe Edmonds’ Agriterra.

The African Development Bank’s soft loans arm has approved $348m in funding for an electricity highway project between Kenya and Ethiopia. The $1.26bn Eastern Electricity Highway Project is the first step towards a regional power pool which many hope will curb electricity price increases and improve security of supply.

The Ethiopian authorities are making progress on plans to create a national oil company, which will handle the government’s participations in licences and work to accelerate exploration and production, but the institution’s name and key operational issues have yet to be decided, senior oil official Ketsela Tadesse told African Energy.

Germany’s Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW), the European Union and the African Union Commission’s Regional Geothermal Coordination Unit are gearing up to select the first projects from their new €50m Geothermal Risk Mitigation Facility (GRMF), to support developments in Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.

The World Bank-backed Eastern Electricity Highway Project will link Ethiopia and Kenya’s power systems as the first phase of an ambitious project to connect the region’s generators and consumers, writes Dan Marks

For too long only a fraction of proposed projects have seen the light of day, but while it is too early to say the African power industry has turned a corner, signs of progress were reflected at EnergyNet’s Africa Energy Forum (AEF) in Berlin on 26-28 June. Veteran southern African project financier Clive Ferreira observed that the African power sector continues to underperform significantly. Projects take too long to reach financial close, procurement processes are not transparent, and low tariffs make investment unattractive. Few could disagree with Ferreira’s conclusion that it is “difficult to make private power work under these circumstances”.

Adamantine Energy, owned by East Africa specialist Chris Matchette-Downes, has been awarded Block 11B in north-west Kenya.

The World Bank Group (WBG) is supporting a major $250m electricity grid improvement project with a $200m loan. The Electricity Network Reinforcement and Expansion Project (Enrep) forms part of the government’s ambitious Growth and Transformation Plan, which aims to add 276,000km of power lines and 8,000MW of installed capacity by 2015.

Kenya’s onshore promise has prompted Tullow Oil to accelerate its drilling programme, and results could prove decisive in settling long-standing disputes over development plans for neighbouring Uganda, but international boundary disputes between Kenya and Ethiopia could pose a risk down the line, writes Adrian J Browne