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The Botala Energy-led Serowe Solar Consortium has won a tender to develop the 4MW Puthi Solar PV plant in the Serowe Energy Hub. Botala is also looking to develop solar/gas hybrid capacity using feedstock from its coal bed methane upstream project.

Mauritius-based Afreenergy has signed an agreement to acquire three commercial and industrial (C&I) solar PV plants in Senegal from French developer GreenYellow, which is divesting from Africa to concentrate on Europe.

Rift Valley Energy (RVE), a subsidiary of French asset manager Meridiam, has provided African Energy with an update on the timelines for its Suma and Liusenga hydroelectric power (HEP) plants in Tanzania.

State-owned Kuvimba Mining Houses (KMH) is holding discussions with potential funding partners to develop mineral beneficiation at its portfolio of mines, where renewable C&I capacity is increasingly supplying power, writes Tonderayi Mukeredzi.

The National Nuclear Regulator (NNR)’s granting of a licence to state power utility Eskom to continue operating Koeberg nuclear power station’s Unit I for another 20 years should provide South Africa with greater energy stability. A review to extend Koeberg unit II by 20 years is still being carried out. South Africa is also making progress with plans to procure 2.5GW of new nuclear capacity.

Veolia Environnement’s sale of majority interest in Casablanca’s water and electricity provider to a new state-owned regional utility is part of a wider shift towards public ownership of the sector in Morocco.

British energy major BP has signed a joint development agreement with a consortium of Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company (Masdar) and the local Hassan Allam Utilities and Infinity Power to explore the potential for a large, multi-phase green hydrogen (GH2) project in Egypt.

The UK/Norway-owned IPP Globeleq has raised $99m of debt financing for Mozambique’s first wind project, adding to its southern African portfolio. Despite industry pessimism over the prospects for utility-scale projects, Globeleq is advancing a large pipeline of greenfield renewable and gas capacity in eastern and southern Africa and is bullish over the future of utility-scale projects, writes Marc Howard.

InfraCo Africa, part of the Private Infrastructure Development Group (PIDG), has committed $1.5m to the 30MWac Vungu solar PV project in Midlands province. InfraCo said Vungu was set to become Zimbabwe’s first solar IPP with international project finance. It is also part of a national pilot programme to develop standardised documents for solar IPPs in the country.

Ethiopia is moving ahead with the fifth filling of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (Gerd), according to Egyptian officials who cited evidence from satellite imagery.

Mozambican regulator Autoridade Reguladora de Energia (Arene) has issued a request for proposals (RfP) for independent power producers (IPPs) to develop and install solar PV and battery energy storage systems (Bess) through the country’s Global Energy Transfer Feed-in Tariff (Get FiT) programme.

Prime Minister Ahmed Hachani has approved plans for the Tunisian portion of the 600MW high-voltage direct current Tunisia-Italy interconnector project (Elmed). First conceived over two decades ago, the revival of the Elmed project reflects increased European demand for imports of renewable power.

With African electricity supply industries in a state of flux, everyone agrees the infrastructure needed for economic development can only come from the private sector, but the existing financial and commercial models are inadequate – and a desperate need for investment in transmission only makes this financing challenge harder. Some new thinking about how to crack these problems was presented at the African Energy Forum in Barcelona, but the boldest ideas require a leap of faith, writes John Hamilton*

The next phase of Egypt’s renewable energy development will stretch over several years, with financial close on the most ambitious projects not expected before 2026. If successful, Cairo could establish a pipeline of projects with several gigawatts of wind generation capacity being added every year into the next decade.

President El Sisi’s cabinet reshuffle is the most significant reshaping of the energy sector’s management in nearly a decade, bringing new ministers to the oil and gas and electricity portfolios, who face daunting challenges as Egypt struggles to meet its ambitions for energy self-sufficiency and to become a regional gas and renewable power hub, writes John Hamilton.