Search results

Office National de l’Electricité (ONE) has selected a consortium led by EDF Energies Nouvelles, in association with Mitsui & Co, as preferred bidder for the 150MW Taza wind project.

The Ministry of Energy and Mines is already quietly downgrading expectations for the outcome of Agence Nationale pour la Valorisation des Ressources en Hydrocarbures (Alnaft)’s third licensing round (AE 193/10).

The World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation has announced an agreement with Oesterreichische Entwicklungsbank (OeEB), the Austrian development bank, to increase sustainable energy investment in sub-Saharan Africa, starting with Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda. OeEB agreed to contribute €2m ($2.6m) to support project development, capacity building and assistance to financial institutions under the Africa Sustainable Energy Facility, a joint IFC and European Investment Bank (EIB) programme to increase investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency. Both institutions are contributing equally to the €60m financing facility, while OeEB, alongside EIB, is providing additional funds for a support unit that will identify and facilitate investments.

The Tunisian government has embarked on a second attempt to persuade the nation of the potential benefits of shale gas exploration after its first attempt encountered popular opposition. On 27 June, minister of industry Mehdi Jomaâ launched a “national debate on energy” at which both caretaker President Moncef Marzouki and Prime Minister Ali Larayedh made speeches. Officials canvassed by African Energy before the launch said that the technical decision to develop shale resources had already been taken in the ministry and at state oil company Entreprise Tunisienne d’Activités Pétrolières (Etap). The task is now to muster the necessary political and popular backing.

Soma Oil & Gas executive director for Africa Hassan Khaire has been named as prime minister in the government of new Somali president Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed. Soma said Khaire had resigned from the board and relinquished all his shares in the company. Khaire, 46, had worked with Soma since the company was founded in 2013, and before that as director for the Norwegian Refugee Council for Somalia and East Africa, having come to Norway in the late 1980s as a refugee.

It all seems like business as usual. Australian Securities Exchange and Alternative Investment Market-listed Range Resources has announced a new financial agreement with its joint venture partner Canada-based Africa Oil Corporation (AOC), for a second exploration well due to be spudded by September. This will be included as part of AOC’s exploration commitments,which oblige it to spend $22.5m in Dharoor and Nugaal before Range reverts to a contributing basis. A Range company report says AOC has satisfied its commitments with regard to Dharoor, but still has around $15m to pay on Nugaal.

The European Investment Bank on 10 September agreed a loan of €75m ($100m) to Eskom to finance the construction of a 100MW concentrating solar power (CSP) plant near Upington, in the Northern Cape. The project is also receiving funding from the African Development Bank, Agence Française de Développement, the Clean Technology Fund, Germany’s KfW and the World Bank.

French consultancy Sofreco has a new technical assistance contract to support the energy agency of the three-nation Great Lakes Economic Community (CEPGL), Energie des Grands Lacs. The 2015-16 contract is intended to build institutional, technical, human and other capacity; update the Regional Energy Master Plan; harmonise norms and standards, and environmental assessment practices; adopt funding, implementation and monitoring procedures for studies and projects; and consolidate the information and communication system.

The government’s decision to abandon controversial plans to create regional electricity distributors shows the state centralising key business decisions, rather than letting the market shape the direction of the supply industry.

In a continuing reshuffle of parastatal heads and other senior posts by the outgoing prime minister, Youssef Chahed, his Tahya Tounès party ally Leila Ouled Ali Bahri is to become head of Steg Energies Renouvelables (ER), the renewables affiliate of state utility Société Tunisienne de l’Electricité et du Gaz. Created in 2010 to promote solar projects, Steg ER has public and a few private sector shareholders, not all of whom are said to be happy with Chahed’s last-minute ‘political’ appointment.

Elecnor subsidiary IQA Group has won UK Export Finance (UKEF) support for a contract to upgrade two substations in Viana, east of Luanda, and Gabela, in Kwanza Sul, over two years.

Two Egyptian refining projects expect to complete loan finance arrangements early this year, writes John Hamilton

Promoted from the ranks to lead the company he originally joined in 1984, Sonatrach chairman and chief executive Rachid Hachichi is struggling to convince Algerians their state energy giant can overcome corruption and win investment without compromising national interests. With politics still in ferment, a weak interim government hopes to pass a revised hydrocarbons law as soon as 15 November – before controversial presidential elections are held on 12 December.

Prime minister Hailemariam Desalegn formally inaugurated the 120MW Ashegoda wind farm on 26 October. The wind farm, which started commissioning a year ago, was developed by France’s Vergnet, which signed a contract with Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation (EEPCo) in October 2008. Lahmeyer carried out feasibility studies and supervised construction. Financing for the €210m ($272m) project was provided by €113m of buyer credit from Compagnie Française d’Assurance pour le Commerce Extérieur, a €45m concessional loan from the Agence Française de Développement, and a €33m tied commercial loan from BNP Paribas. EEPCo provided €19m in local currency.

US conglomerate GE has announced plans to develop a 100MW wind farm in Ngong, 20km south-west of Nairobi. GE chairman and chief executive Jeffrey Immelt told reporters in Nairobi that a strategic memorandum of understanding would be signed between GE and the Kenya government GE plans 100MW wind farm at Ngong