NAN-F-4
Energy
Paris, Nov. 4, 2016 (Reuters/NAN) Italian utility Enel is well on track to build 5,000 megawatts worth of renewable capacity in Africa despite political unrest in North Africa and the lack of electric power connections between countries, the report said.
Early 2015, Enel laid out plans to invest in African renewable and power grids, with a target of 5,000 megawatts (MW) capacity in solar and wind.
Two years later, Enel which operates 66,500 MW of capacity mainly in southern Europe has nearly 1,000 MW of solar and wind under construction in South Africa and 200-300 MW in operation.
While an Enel-led consortium is starting to build 850 MW of wind capacity in Morocco after winning a tender in early 2016.
“About 2,000 of those 5,000 megawatts are already in execution.
“We are working on the other 3,000,’’ Enel Chief Executive, Francesco Starace said ahead of the New York Times Energy for Tomorrow conference in Paris.
Starace said Enel is now exploring a 300 MW geothermal project in Ethiopia and a 50 MW in Kenya and in June won a tender for a 34 MW solar project in Zambia.
Starace said the big challenge in the electrification of Africa is political instability in parts of North Africa, notably Egypt, Libya and Algeria, which have huge potential but lack the conditions for power investment.
He said the southern part of Africa was seeing good renewable energy investment flows.
Starace said countries in East Africa notably Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and Mozambique were creating the right framework for power investment by establishing cross-border power interconnections.
He said the lack of interconnections, which effectively makes each country an island in terms of electric power, is holding back investment in West Africa. (Reuters/NAN)
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Edited by Damilola Oyewole/Morayo Omolade