Friday, June 15, 2012

Kenya:

Kenya courts private geothermal investors (Engineering News)

(Courtesy CIA World Factbook)
Kenya is courting private-sector investors to help accelerate the development of geothermal power projects and tackle the country’s chronic power deficit.

After it became apparent that raising about $2-billion to finance the building of geothermal plants with a combined capacity of 2,000 MWe would be a tall order, the authorities decided to target equity investors to finance the projects.

The State-owned Geothermal Development Corporation (GDC) has already put out bids inviting equity investors to fund the installation of 800 MWe of capacity at a cost of $800-million.

The GDC says it would like to enter into joint venture agreements with four equity investors to fund the Menengai II project, where 120 wells will be drilled, with the steam sold to power generators like the Kenya Electricity Generating Company.