{{The African Union (AU) and Iceland’s private power developer Reykjavik Geothermal have signed a grant contract worth US$8mn for a geothermal project in Ethiopia
\nThe project comprises the drilling of two wells at the Corbetti geothermal power project. }} <\/p>\n
The first phase will cost US$2bn and will result in 500MW of power being brought on line for five years. The second phase will provide an additional 500MW for eight years, industry sources said.<\/p>\n
The entire project will cost US$4bn, according to Reykjavik Geothermal.<\/p>\n
Officials at Reykjavik Geothermal said, “Ethiopia has a rapidly growing economy. <\/p>\n
The shortfall in the power sector has been identified as a major impediment to the continued growth of Ethiopia. The untapped geothermal resources of Ethiopia are plentiful and accessible. <\/p>\n
Developers can quickly improve indigenous infrastructures and boost local economies while utilising environmentally sound best practices and technologies. The project ties with Ethiopia’s ambitious plans to become a carbon-neutral economy by 2025.”<\/p>\n
The grant contract was awarded under the AU-led ‘geothermal risk mitigation facility’, which is designed to encourage public-private investment and financial support for geothermal exploration in East Africa.<\/p>\n
Reykjavik Geothermal has acquired exploration licenses covering an area of more than 6,500-sq-km in the Southern Lakes District of the Central Main Ethiopian Rift Valley. <\/p>\n
Within this area, the company’s scientists have “pinpointed an area of 200-sq-km in which high temperatures of up to 350\u00b0C have been identified, indicating a potential of 50 to 1,000 MWe”, making it ideal for harnessing geothermal power, the company said.<\/p>\n
The project plans to utilise geothermal energy from three different resources at Corbetti, Tulu Moyer and Abaya.<\/p>\n
Reykjavik Geothermal is currently negotiating with the state-owned Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation for a “25-year-plus” power purchase agreement (PPA). Exploration drilling was initially scheduled to start in Q1 2014 and is expected to last eight months.<\/p>\n
Production drilling and construction of the first phase is scheduled to start after financial closing in Q1 2015, added the company.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{{The African Union (AU) and Iceland’s private power developer Reykjavik Geothermal have signed a grant contract worth US$8mn for a geothermal project in Ethiopia The project comprises the drilling of two wells at the Corbetti geothermal power project. }} The first phase will cost US$2bn and will result in 500MW of power being brought on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2000052612,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[99],"byline":[334],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-14889","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science-technology","tag-greatlakesnews","byline-igihe-reporter"],"bylines":[{"id":334,"name":"IGIHE Reporter","slug":"igihe-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":334,"name":"IGIHE Reporter","slug":"igihe-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":{"id":2000052612,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14889.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14889.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14889.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14889.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14889.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton14889.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14889","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000052612"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14889"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=14889"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=14889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}