UGANDA
Power lines to double by 2017
Uganda planned to double the length of its power grid in four years at a cost of $500 million (R5 billion) as it sought to boost electricity production and cut transmission losses, a senior government official said yesterday. The country is keen to expand its electricity generation infrastructure rapidly before its planned start of crude oil production by 2017. Simon D’Ujanga, Uganda’s state minister for energy, said the country planned to expand its power lines from 1 700km to 3 400km. “The transmission network will be doubled… within the next four years. We have six transmission line projects totalling $500m, these being implemented concurrently,” D’Ujanga told a regional east Africa power industry conference. Projects included lines serving domestic markets in Uganda, a separate line connecting it to Kenya and another to Rwanda.
KENYA
Wind project to begin next year
Construction of Kenya’s delayed Lake Turkana wind power project should begin in the first quarter of next year with a shortfall in funding expected to be filled by the end of the year, a co-developer of one of the largest African undertakings of its kind said yesterday. The wind farm would have a capacity of 300 megawatts, helping plug a power supply shortfall. “Quarter one next year we should be in construction,” Aldwych International regional director Christian Wright said. “Then it’s about 23 months to the first 50MW of power, then about another seven months or so to get the full 300MW.” The European Investment Bank said it had board approval to disburse e200 million (R2.6 billion) to help finance the project.
