The Government approved this Wednesday the terms and conditions of the concession contract for the Nacala Thermal Power Plant, with a maximum capacity of 250 megawatts (MW), for the production and sale of electricity, the Council of Ministers announced in a statement.
The plant should feed the public grid and "contribute to the export of energy," says the document, without detailing the terms.
The concession includes the entire process, from the design, to the operation and management of the plant, as well as the energy transport and interconnection infrastructure.
The plant, an investment by the company GL Energy, is part of a package of projects presented since 2017 to take advantage of the domestic share of natural gas from the Rovuma basin.
The gas should begin to be explored and piped onshore from deposits under the sea off Cabo Delgado in the next few years, but the first phase of GL's Nacala plant is expected to start operating even before that milestone.
"The plant will be built in phases: in the first phase a 50 MW plant will be built, the second phase will add another 65MW and in the third phase another 135 MW, reaching a total of 250 MW," reads the Environmental Impact Assessment available on the Internet.
"Phases two and three will only be built after gas from the Rovuma basin becomes available. For the total installed capacity, the production equipment will consist of 27 gas engine generators," and the plant will be fed by a pipeline foreseen in Mozambique's Natural Gas Master Plan.
The overall investment value of the project, "for the maximum capacity of the plant (250 MW), is estimated at $400 million" and "the investment value for the first phase (50 MW) is estimated at $90 million," he adds.
Construction of the first phase of the project is expected to take 16 months from the start date, to be announced.
Currently, Mozambique has to import other fuels to power a floating thermal power plant owned by a private company, anchored off Nacala, to ensure reliable system power in the northern region, and also to supply power to the Republic of Zambia.
Lusa Agency