Wednesday, Nov 16, 2016

Abu Dhabi: Egypt’s minister of electricity and renewable energy said the country is focusing on improving the transmission and distribution network to meet the electricity demand and have commissioned installing 1500 kilometre of 500 kilovolt transmission network.

“This is a huge undertaking as it represents one third of already existing in the country now. We are installing about nine substations of extra high voltage which are under construction at present. We are working hard to close the gap in transmission,” said Mohammad Shaker Al Markabi while speaking to Gulf News on the sidelines of Arab-Germany energy forum in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday.

The Egyptian government is undertaking reforms in the energy sector to improve government’s finances.

It has recently increased electricity tariffs as part of its five-year campaign to restructure subsidies and cut down on government expenses.

Al Markabi said the reforms are yielding results with people focusing on conserving energy due to extra tariffs levied for high consumption. “We were under pressure due to power outages. Now people are trying to conserve energy due to increase in tariffs. There is no power shortage in the country.”

Speaking on power generation, he said they have plans to introduce nuclear power station in the network, coal-fired power station and renewable energy, adding that the country is trying to finalise a contract to build a nuclear power plant by the end of the year with Russian company Rosatom.

It is also planning to build 6,000 megawatts of coal-fired power plant in Hamarawein on the red sea coast with companies from Japan, Korea and China bidding for the project.

“We have about 750 megawatt of wind energy and we have two other projects which are about to be signed. We are talking to companies in Denmark and GE in the US for future projects,” Al Markabi said.

Egypt also signed an 8-billion euro (Dh31.4 billion) contract with Siemens to increase power generation capacity by 50 per cent last year.

By Fareed Rahman Senior Reporter

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