Today, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency awarded a grant to NextGen Solawazi Limited to support the implementation of a 5 megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic power plant in Kigoma, Tanzania. The grant was signed by NextGen Managing Director Mayank Bhargava and USTDA Director Leocadia I. Zak.
USTDA is funding an Owner's Engineer who will provide NextGen with comprehensive on- and off-site engineering services and oversee the work performed by the project's engineering, procurement and construction contractor. The Owner's Engineer will help ensure that the Kigoma plant is technically sound and meets its performance metrics in a timely, cost-efficient way.
"USTDA is pleased to work with our partners from NextGen Solawazi to support the development of renewable energy in western Tanzania," said Director Zak. "This project presents a valuable opportunity to draw upon U.S. technical expertise to increase energy generation in Kigoma."
NextGen has been licensed by the Tanzanian power utility, TANESCO, to generate up to 40 MW of solar power throughout the country. During the signing ceremony, Mr. Bhargava described the goals of the project:"Even in its pilot stages, the Kigoma plant will have the capacity to power around 50,000 households. It is expected to generate about 10 gigawatts of clean electricity each year, reducing greenhouse gas emissions by about 10,500 tons of carbon dioxide annually."
The project advances the goals of Power Africa, a U.S. government-led initiative to double access to power in sub-Saharan Africa over the next five years. Power Africa is mobilizing resources from the public and private sectors in both the U.S. and Africa to add 10,000 MW of cleaner, more efficient electricity generation capacity across the sub-continent.
The grant funds for this technical assistance come from the U.S.-Africa Clean Energy Finance (US-ACEF) Initiative. US-ACEF is an innovative collaborative financing mechanism aligning U.S. government resources from USTDA, the State Department and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation to catalyze private sector investment to develop Africa's clean energy infrastructure.
