SOME 150 megawatts of natural gas generated electricity will be produced at Kinyerezi in the outskirts of Dar es Salaam by mid this year, as part of implementation of Big Results Now (BRN) initiative.
The Deputy Managing Director of the Tanzania Electric Supply Company (Tanesco), Mr Decklan Mhaiki, told religious leaders who inspected construction of the over 500-kilometre gas pipeline linking Mtwara to Dar es Salaam on Wednesday that the 150MW is part of Phase I of the project, which has four phases targeting to produce 1,300MW of electricity by 2015.
"The contractor for the project, Messrs Jacobsen Elektro AS of Norway, is on schedule and we should be having the 150MW electricity by the middle of this year," Mr Mhaiki said.
He noted that under Kinyerezi phases II, III and IV, some 240MW, 450MW and 500MW respectively, will be produced by 2015 as the government makes good its promise to alleviate load shedding in the next two years.
Mr Mhaiki said another 350MW will also be produced at Somanga Fungu in Kilwa District within the next two years following construction of an additional 24-inch gas pipeline from Songosongo to Dar es Salaam with a branch at Somanga Fungu.
Established in Norway in 1891, Jacobsen Elektro AS undertook a 100MW power project at Ubungo in Dar es Salaam in 2011.
The Deputy Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Energy and Minerals, Eng. Ngosi Mwihava, told the clerics that the government is committed to ensuring reliable, affordable and outage- free power supply by 2015.
"As you have witnessed all along, work on laying the pipeline from Mtwara to Kinyerezi is going on well and we should be producing electricity from this point by 2015," Eng. Mwihava said.
He acknowledged concern by the leaders that hiked tariffs will deny the majority poor access to electricity and promised that the government will do everything possible to arrest the price surge.
The clerics' secretariat leader, Mr John Mapesa from the Christian Council of Tanzania (CCT), said religious leaders are concerned about the rapid increase of power tariffs and regular power outages which affects quality of the service.
"We hope that tariff increases and regular power fluctuations will be kept under control," Mr Mapesa noted as religious clerics blamed Tanesco for failure to improve the service while pushing for hiked power tariffs.
Other projects under BRN include 50MW from Singida Wind Power and 200MW from Kiwira Coal with a record 150,000 new consumer connections by 2015.
The Minister for Energy and Minerals, Prof Sospeter Muhongo, said in Parliament last month that his ministry's key projects towards the BRN also targets to increase electricity units consumed per person from 97 currently to 490 by 2025.