Zesa keeps up with Zim-Asset energy targets

FOR Zimbabwe, 2017 will bring a Christmas cheer with a difference. In fulfilment of Government’s Zim-Asset energy targets, Zesa has promised that Kariba South Power Station unit 7 will start feeding 150 megawatts onto the national power grid, a day before Christmas.

The most heartening aspect is the fact that boosting local production will provide security and reliability to supply, given challenges around foreign payments and availability of funding.

Zesa has had to incur bills running into millions of dollars due to difficulties in making foreign payments caused by liquidity challenges and limited inflow due to its huge debtors book.

The power utility has done extremely well under the circumstances, where it has struggled to maintain consistent power supply at a time when it is also being significantly weighed down by a sub-economic tariff and over a $1 billion in outstanding bills for power already consumed.

Power generation and transmission are, arguably, capital intensive, rigorous and highly technical undertakings, which are not as easy a job as fulfilling our ordinary and everyday routines.

Access to power is critical given its importance for economic development and the negative socio-economic impact of inconsistent supply, let alone deficits, as had been the curse. For an economy battling to recover from over a decade of down spiral, regular powers cuts cause devastating knee jerks on the economy, as that affects production and invite unplanned costs.

Most importantly, given foreign currency problems in Zimbabwe, increasing local generation will mean the country will make huge savings for deployment in other critical areas.

Zimbabwe currently requires about 1 400MW, but constrained supply due to a host of factors, including old equipment and lack of funding to invest in the power infrastructure capital programmes.

In terms of all Zim-Asset targets, Kariba South is setting the pace and with the arrival of more key equipment on Tuesday, overall project completion will take a huge leap forward.

According to Zesa Holdings, the manufacture of electro-mechanical equipment is now at 62 percent, most of the hydro-mechanical equipment has been delivered and has already been installed.

Officials said last week that the manufacture of electrical equipment is at 82 percent while civil works are at 85 percent.

It is expected that the project will be completed within the budgeted total cost of $533 million.

During a visit of the Kariba South Power Station extension project, which will add a combined 300 megawatts to the grid, it was heartening to learn that the first 150MW, out of 300MW, will come on stream on the December 24, but commissioning will start much earlier.

It is anticipated that the second generation unit will be completed early next and is expected to start feeding the grid on March 10, 2018, which will significantly whittle down imports.

With overall project completion, as of last week, reported at 71 percent, progress to date is encouraging as it relates to energy targets set in Government’s medium term economic policy Zim-Asset.

Kariba South extension marks the first of bold steps Zimbabwe has made towards making the country energy self-sufficient, which should go a long way in helping preserve foreign currency.

Admittedly, energy is a key enabler to productivity and socio-economic development for every country.

However, the sector has experienced challenges due to dilapidated and obsolete generation equipment, infrastructure and inadequate financing, capitalisation and other structural bottlenecks.

As such, the plan on energy will in addition, prioritise attainment of optimal generation of power, the production and use of bio-fuels as enablers for economic productivity and growth.

Specific outputs and targets were set out clearly in the Zim-Asset policy, Government’s medium term plan from 2013 to 2018.

To this end, Zesa has done well to make sure these targets are met.

A number of assumptions will underpin the optimal generation and use of energy in the economy and these include raising the installed generation capacity of existing power stations to their optimum, expansion of existing power stations such as Hwange and Kariba and completion of new big and mini-hydro-power projects such as Batoka Gorge and Gairezi hydro power plant, respectively.

Further, the plan will entail resuscitating small thermal power stations of Harare, Bulawayo and Munyati to full power generation capacity, full utilisation of alternative forms of energy such as Coal bed methane gas; and development of solar and wind energy.

Targeted projects included the refurbishment of internal power stations to add another 300MW, expanding Kariba to add 300MW, building Batoka to generate 1 600MW, constructing 3x100MW solar energy plants and constructing units 7 and 8 to boost power production at Hwange by 600MW, among many others.

These initiatives, both public and private, will make Zimbabwe self-reliant once completed.