Siân Crampsie
Enel is set to build five new wind
farms in South Africa after sealing a
financing deal for the projects.
The Italian firm has agreed €950 million
($1.11 billion) of finance with
Absa and Nedbank to support development
of 700 MW of capacity.
The deal brings the five wind farms
to financial close and will enable Enel
to bring them on-line by 2021. Enel is
putting €230 million of its own money
into the projects, located in Eastern and
Northern Cape provinces.
Antonio Cammisecra, head of Enel’s
global renewable energy section, said
the decision was an important milestone
for Enel in South Africa, where
it already operates 520 MW of renewable
energy capacity.
The projects in question are Garob,
Karusa and Soetwater in the Northern
Cape province, as well as Oyster Bay
and Nxuba in the Eastern Cape province.
Each scheme has a capacity of
around 140 MW and is minority owned
by a local investor.
They were all awarded contracts in
the fourth round of the South African
government’s Renewable Energy Independent
Power Producer Procurement
Programme (REIPPPP). Construction
of Nxuba is expected to start
later this year, followed by Oyster Bay
and Garobin the first half of 2019 and
Soetwater and Karusa in the second
half of 2019.
Enel’s finance deal indicates that
projects are once again starting to
move forward in South Africa following
delays caused by Eskom’s refusal
to sign contracts with developers. In
June, Mainstream Renewable Power
announced it had reached financial
close on two wind power projects in
South Africa.
In August, local renewable energy
investor, Vantage GreenX Fund Managers,
announced it had provided
R2.05 billion ($140.4 million) of
funding to a combination of six solar
and wind energy projects with a combined
capacity of 433 MW. Globeleq
in July signed an agreement with
Brookfield Asset Management to acquire
majority stakes in the six projects,
which have a combined capacity
of 178 MW.
The REIPPP programme is designed
to bring 7000 MW of clean energy
capacity on line in South Africa by
2020. Eskom, however, is also continuing
to pursue fossil fuel power
plant projects such as Kusile and
Medupi.
In July Eskom secured a $2.5 billion
loan from the China Development
Bank to help it complete the Kusile
power plant project in Mpumalanga.
The 4764 MW Medupi power plant
will be completed in two years, followed
in 2023 by the 4800 MW Kusile
plant. They will be among the largest
coal fired power plants in the world.
8
THE ENERGY INDUSTRY TIMES - SEPTEMBER 2018
International News
Enel moves forward on
SA wind projects
n 700 MW on-line by 2021 n Eskom seals $2.5 billion finance deal
Egypt drives wind sector forward
n More wind capacity for Gulf of Suez n Nuclear plant on track
ACWA Power will develop a 500 MW
wind farm in Egypt after the country’s
cabinet economic policy committee
approved the project.
The agreement in August came just
a month after a consortium of Japan’s
Toyota Tsusho, France’s Engie and
Egypt’s Orascom Construction announced
that it had signed an agreement
to begin development work on
a 500 MW wind farm in the same region,
and indicates a continuing drive
in Egypt to bolster power generating
capacity.
The award to ACWA Power was
based on a proposed tariff of ¢3.12/
kWh, according to local media reports.
ACWA Power will now negotiate with
the New and Renewable Energy Agency
(NREA) over contracts to allow it
to commence work, including the allocation
of land.
The NREA has been allocated 1420
km2 in the Gulf of Suez region for the
development of new wind farms.
The Toyota Tsusho-Engie-Orascom
consortium said in July that it had concluded
agreements with the NREA and
the Egyptian Electricity Transmission
Company for its 500 MW project. The
consortium said that it expects to conclude
the documentation and financing
by the third or fourth quarter of 2019.
The same consortium is also building
a 250 MW wind farm in the Gulf of
Suez that is due on-line in 2019.
In August, Egypt’s Energy and Electricity
Ministry said that construction
of the country’s first nuclear power
plant would begin in the next 2-3 years,
and that the 4800 MW plant would start
operating by 2026.
Morocco 900 MW wind farm to
power blockchain facility
Blockchain firm Soluna says that a
proposed 900 MW wind farm in Morocco
will be used to power a blockchain
computing facility.
Soluna, a unit of New York private
equity firm Brookstone Partners, has
announced that the wind farm will be
built across an area of 15 000 hectares
in southern Morocco. The site has
Class I wind conditions, where wind
speeds reach over 35 km/h, making it
one of the highest quality wind sites in
the world.
“Our vision is to power the blockchain
with clean, renewable energy
that we own and control,” said John
Belizaire, CEO of Soluna. “Soluna
will address the growing demand for
energy to power today’s growing
blockchain networks, and will create
the world’s first “service node,” providing
high-density computing for
future blockchain networks.”
Brookstone founded Soluna in 2018
to power the blockchain economy with
clean, low-cost renewable energy. Its
strategy is to develop renewable energy
power plants dedicated to on-site,
high-density computing.
Brookstone announced it will finance
the flagship wind-blockchain project,
investing $100 million in a first phase
of 36 MW. The 900 MW project will
cost a total of $3 billion.
The managing director of Brookstone,
Michael Toporek, said that the
company has exclusive rights to the
area for the wind farm, “but the issue
was there’s no real place to put the
electricity”.
He added: “These days, what you can
do with stranded power is set up a computing
center, develop this as an offgrid
project.”
Blockchain – the technology underpinning
Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies
– consumes large amounts of
energy because transactions have to
be verified by ‘miners’ running specialised
software.
According to Digiconimist, Bitcoin
mining now uses 71 TWh per year –
equivalent to ten per cent of China’s
annual power usage.
Gabon ready for solar-hybrid fleet
Engie is set to begin construction of
a fleet of eight hybrid solar power
plants in Gabon.
The energy giant has signed an
agreement with Gabonese financial
institution Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations
(CDC), to deploy the eight
plants, which have a combined total
capacity of 2.2 MW.
Ausar Energy, a subsidiary of Engie,
developed the hybrid solution in collaboration
with CDC, the Gabonese
Ministry of Energy, and the Gabonese
energy and water company Société
d’Énergie et d’Eau du Gabon (SEEG).
The solar-hybrid plants will be used
in locations that currently rely on oilfired
thermal generation.
The solar-hybrid project will contribute
to the Gabonese Republic’s
policy of using renewable energy –
solar and hydropower – to increase
the country’s power generating capacity.
The project will save the country
1 million litres of fuel oil per year, or
2600 tonnes of CO2, and reduce generation
costs by 30 per cent.
Moscow and Cairo signed an agreement
in 2015 for Russia to build a
nuclear power plant in Dabaa along
the northwestern coast of Egypt. The
project will be financed by a $25 billion
Russian loan – representing 85 per cent
of the total project cost – with Egypt
funding the remaining 15 per cent.
Russian engineers are currently performing
site investigations and developing
the final design for the four 1200
MW reactors.
n Egyptian President Abdel Fattah
al-Sisi has inaugurated the ‘mega’
power plants in Egypt built by Orascom
and Siemens. The New Capital,
Beni Suef and Burullus combined
cycle plants have a total capacity of
14 400 MW and were completed in
just 27.5 months. “The completion of
the power plants is a significant milestone
in the government’s strategy to
modernise energy infrastructure in
Egypt to drive industrial growth and
economic progress,” said H.E. Dr.
Mohamed Shaker, the Egyptian Minister
of Electricity and Renewable
Energy.
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