Watch: Nyusi re-inaugurates Mavuzi power station – AIM report

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Watch: Nyusi re-inaugurates Mavuzi power station – AIM report

7:55 CAT | 28 Mar 2017

Folha de Maputo

Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi on Monday re-inaugurated the Mavuzi hydro-electric station, on the Revue river at Sussundenga, in the central province of Manica.

After total rehabilitation, which began in November 2013, the generating capacity of the Mavuzi station has risen from 25 to about 42 megawatts.

The rehabilitation of the power station cost about 120 million US dollars. It consisted of overhauling the turbines and alternators, installing new transformers, and a new auxiliary low voltage system, and rehabilitating the high voltage equipment in the main substation. Professional training of staff from the publicly owned electricity company, EDM, was also part of the project.

Speaking at the ceremony, Nyusi said that the challenges resulting from new projects, together with the demand generated by the emerging extractive sector, are among the factors that obliged the government to rehabilitate the Mavuzi station.

“Our concern with regional and local economic development, and the imminent reduction in the useful life of this power station, led to the rehabilitation, intended to ensure that Mavuzi can continue to generate electricity for another 30 years”, he said.

Rehabilitation of a second power station on the Revue, at Chicamba, is now in its final phase. Between them Mavuzi and Chicamba will provide an extra 80 megawatts of generating capacity which will supply Manica and the neighbouring province of Sofala. Some of the power from these two dams will also be sold to Zimbabwe.

Despite this advance, Nyusi said the country still faces a major challenge in expanding the national grid, since in 2016 it only reached 26 per cent of the population. “The infrastructure of the national electricity grid is still limited and remains incapable of meeting the growing demand for reliable, good quality electricity”, the President added.

The limited reach of the electricity grid meant that the great majority of the Mozambican population still relies on wood fuel (charcoal and firewood) as sources of energy, with all the damaging environmental consequences that flow from this.

Nyusi encouraged the population of Manica to produce more food, by exploiting the abundance of arable land in the province, and to take advantage of the available electricity for agro-processing and food conservation.

“With electricity, we can guarantee local agro-processing and the availability of the cold chain to conserve food and distribute it to the national, regional and global markets with the necessary quality”, he said. “Manica, with its high agricultural potential, should feel challenged to become a leader in agricultural production and productivity”.

The Mavuzi power station was built 60 years ago, and is the oldest power station owed by EDM. Originally it could generate 52 megawatts, but as the equipment became obsolete this dropped to 25 megawatts.

The rehabilitation of Mavuzi and Chicamba has been financed by Sweden with a grant of about 36 million euros (39 million US dollars), by the French Development Agency (AFD) with a soft loan of 50 million euros, and by Germany with a commercial loan of 18 million euros.