The Maputo Combined Cycle Thermoelectric Plant is expected to start operating in full in August 2018, after the first fuel is burned in January of that year, the director of Production Services of Mozambique’s state electricity company, EdM.

Narendra Gulab, speaking during a visit to the construction site by the Japanese ambassador to Mozambique, Toshio Ikeda, said the first tests of the equipment for gas supply and the compressors, should begin in December.

The facility, located in the Luís Cabral neighbourhood of Maputo, is the first combined cycle plant in the country and in southern Africa, and will produce 106 megawatts of electricity from natural gas extracted from Pande and Temane in the province of Inhambane.

The project has an estimated cost of US$180 million, of which US$167 million will be provided by the Japanese government through the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and the remaining US$13 million by EdM from its own funds.

The loan will be paid back over 40 years, with a grace period of 10 years, at an annual interest rate of 0.01%, according to information released at the time and quoted by daily newspaper Notícias.

The power plant project, along with a project to recover the Mavuzi and Chicamba hydroelectric plants, in the central province of Manica, will help to diversify energy sources and increase EdM’s production capacity from 206 megawatts to around 315 megawatts from mid-2018. (macauhub)