Ethiopia: Genale hydro power plant and the Aisha wind farm to come online

Genale Hydroelectric Project

The power of Ethiopia’s national grid is set to increase following the completion of two energy projects being carried out by the Ministry of Water, Irrigation, and Energy. These two projects are the Genale hydroelectric stations and the Aisha Wind Farm.  The two projects will give an additional 374MW into the grid.

The Genale hydroelectric project is set to be commissioned in the coming new month. The project is being undertaken by a Chinese Company China Gezhouaba Group Company (CGGC).

The project is located in the Genale Dawa River Basin in the Oromia region of southern Ethiopia. It has a reservoir capable of holding 3.2 million m3 of water. This gives it the capacity to generate 250MW. The project has been financed on loan by China Exim Bank, also with contribution from the Government of Ethiopia.

The Aisha wind farm

The government of Ethiopia is also constructing the Aisha wind farm located in the Somali region, east of the country. A Chinese company Dongfang Electric Corp was awarded the tender to do the project.

The wind farm is set to come online in January 2020. The construction of the project began in 2016 and is part of Ethiopia’s Growth and Transformation Plan (GTP II) under which the Ethiopian government plans to build nine wind farms.

The Growth and Transformation Plan involves the construction of 13.7 GW of new renewable capacity from sources other than hydroelectric in the coming years, in order to diversify the Ethiopian energy generation mix.

The current Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, in office since May 2018, has carried on the green commitment of his predecessors. Because of this, and a stable regulatory framework based on tenders and PPAs, Ethiopia has the potential to speed up its journey toward sustainable development and overcome the many contradictions still present.