Mozambique: EDM replaces Nacala floating power station

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Mozambique: EDM replaces Nacala floating power station

11:04 CAT | 21 Nov 2019

File photo: RM

Mozambique’s public owned electricity company, EDM, announced on Wednesday that it is replacing the floating power station currently anchored in the Bay of Nacala, off the coast of the northern province of Nampula.

It will be replaced by a second floating station which, like the first, has been converted to its current use in a Turkish shipyard.

The director of EDM Operations and Systems, Nilsa Pelembe, told a Maputo press conference that the upgrade will lead to an improvement in the quality of the electricity supplied to the north of the country.

The old power station, she said, which was installed in 2016, had proved unable to regulate the current correctly. These problems will be solved by the new floating power station, thus leading to a better quality of power.

Pelembe said the existing station will be disconnected from the EDM grid on Saturday and Sunday. Between 25 November and 2 December, the new equipment will be installed and tested. EDM warns that, during the installation period, there will be a decline in the quality of the electricity, and possibly even power cuts.

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Pelembe said that EDM teams will be on the ground in the north to mitigate any negative impacts from the changeover. During this period, the northern provinces will depend on power generated at the Cahora Bassa dam on the Zambezi river – just as they did before there was a power station in Nacala Bay.

But the long distances (over 1,000 kilometres from Cahora Bassa to Nacala, for instance) make interruptions to the power supply more likely.

“The great reason for the swap is to guarantee greater reliability of the northern electricity system”, explained Pelembe. The new station is equipped with a power system stabiliser, which allows rapid stabilisation of the system in the event of any disturbance.

The old generator was diesel fired. The new one can work on both diesel and natural gas. During installation, industrial consumers are asked to reduce their electricity consumption, in order to avoid black-outs that would hit domestic consumers.

ALSO READ: First floating power station in Africa to supply power to northern Mozambique and Zambia

The floating power station has an installed capacity of 110 megawatts, but initially will only be generating 40 megawatts.

The floating power station also used to provide electricity that was sold to Zambia. However, the Zambians terminated this contract in 2018.