Uganda’s largest electricity generation facility, Karuma Hydropower Project (KHP) has been officially switched on, effectively pumping out 600MW to the national grid.
President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda on Thursday drove to the site to switch on the facility located in Kiryandongo district, 258km from the capital Kampala.
“I thank our Chinese partners who brought 85% of the funding and we put in 15% from the energy fund to be able to build that wonderful facility. I am therefore grateful to China, and in particular, to SinoHydro, for doing a very good job,” President Museveni said.
Construction of the U$1.7billion Karuma Hydropower Station began in 2013 financed by China’s Exim Bank.
China’s Exim Bank provided a U$1.4 billion loan for the project, while the government of Uganda handled the remaining costs.
Karuma dam construction was marred by delays. It is accompanied by a 400 kV transmission line that launched alongside it.
The station has six vertical Francis turbine-generator units, each with a capacity of 100 MW. Construction of Karuma Hydropower project was done by Chinese hydropower company Sinohydro Corporation.
Meanwhile, a U$180million transmission line is currently under construction to share the electricity from Uganda with South Sudan.
According to Chinese Ambassador to Uganda Zhang Lizhong, this project will also support power developments in neighbouring countries such as Rwanda, Tanzania and Kenya to which Uganda exports electricity.
Uganda has a target of increasing the nation’s generation capacity to 52,000MW of electricity by 2040.
Uganda has more Hydropower project line-up including; Ayago, Kiba and Oriang hydropower projects with a combined generation capacity of 890MW, 400MW and 390MW respectively.
“The next is Ayago, which will give us 840MW, but we must be clear about the target we are looking to attain as a country. The energy engineers should work out the Kilowatt-hour per capita that Uganda needs. We need to be guided so that we calculate our needs based on the population. The target should be for us to have enough electricity for a modern person in our circumstances,” Museveni said.
In 2005, Uganda’s generation capacity was 380MW. After switching on the Karuma dam, the total generation capacity has reached 2,200MW.
Uganda has a goal of achieving 80% of its electricity access by 2040, with about 30% access rate currently.
Uganda is trying to prepare for a modern economy which Museveni says will be hinged on four sectors including; Commercial Agriculture, Manufacturing, Services and the ICT which will be facilitated by large energy consumption.
According to Museveni, his government is pressing for lowering the cost of electricity to ensure the cheap cost of production.