The photo is sourced from afrik21.afric
The project total share of Scatec and EDF will be 55%: the Malawi Government will have 30% and ITC – 15%. The project will be implemented on the Shire, the country’s largest river, which is just over 400 km long. The new HPP will provide electricity to two million people (with the country’s population of 19.1 million) and save annually 520,000 tons of carbon dioxide, which is equivalent to a third of Malawi’s annual CO2 emissions (1.5 million tons per year).
The project will partially solve the problem of energy shortage, which remains chronic for Malawi. According to the World Bank, only 54% of the households in the cities of Malawi have access to electricity, as for the rural areas, it is just 6.6% of them, while the country’s level of urbanisation is 18%. In addition to construction of the new hydropower plant, Malawi is trying to improve its energy supply by constructing solar power plants (SPPs), including the Salima (75 km east of Lilongwe) and Golomoti (100 km southeast of Lilongwe) projects with 60MW and 20MW capacity respectively.
Bioenergy power plants remain the third largest source of power generation for Malawi, with a total capacity of 12 MW in the country. These types of generators can be used in an island mode, without connection to a public power grid. An example is power plants using fruits of croton as biofuel. Croton is a drought-resistant tree growing in East African countries, among which is also Malawi. Fuel from croton fruits is obtained by pressing: the oil squeezed out of nuts under high pressure can be used as a raw material for electric generators. EcoFix, a Kenyan company, is dealing with commercialised of this technology.
