Tanesco mulls more renewable energy projects
Posted on : Wednesday , 27th May 2015
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Tanzania Electric Supply Company (Tanesco) Managing Director, Engineer Felchem Mramba, said although renewable energy technology is currently expensive but the future remains in exploiting wind and solar.
“Traditional energy sources such as gas and coal will be depleted over time but wind and solar will always be there,” Mr Mramba said after officiating at a World Bank sponsored Mapping of Solar and Wind Energy in Tanzania.
He pointed out that although currently the country has huge natural gas, thermal and other depleting energy sources, the future requires that the state owned utility invests in wind and solar energy.
“This exercise of mapping our renewable energy potential by World Bank is welcome because it helps us plan and strategise for the future,” Tanesco Managing Director pointed out.
An average wind farm or solar panels plant with capacity of generating 300 megawatts costs between 500 million US dollars and 800 million US dollars.
The World Bank has already commissioned some of these projects in South Africa and Morocco. Mramba said with time and advanced technologies being introduced in a competitive global market, such costs will likely fall to levels where Tanesco will invest in renewable energy sources.
World Bank Senior Energy Specialist, Oliver Knight said Tanzania is one of the 12 countries in the world where World Bank through ESMAP can succeed in such a project.
“Preliminary results show that the whole of Tanzania has the potential of renewable energy such as wind and solar but the difference is that some places are excellent,” Mr Knight noted, saying Phase I of the project only present computer generated estimates.
He said eight wind and solar stations will be placed countrywide where actual data on the two sources of energy will be collected over the next two years. “Only then will we have validated results which can be the basis for investment,” pointed out Knight.
The World Bank expert further noted that renewable energy projects are only expensive at initial investment stages but later on costs are lower.
Under the ESMAP project, Tanzania has been allocated 3m US dollars to conclude data collection and site visits. The whole project is worth 22.5m US dollars and Tanzania is one of the single largest beneficiaries.
Established in 1983, the Energy Sector Management Assistance Programme (ESMAP) is a global, multidonor technical assistance trust fund administered by the World Bank and cosponsored by 13 official bilateral donors.
Source : IN 2 EAST AFRICA
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