Egenco needs k18bn To restore power

 Electricity Generation Company (Egenco) says it needs about K18 billion to restore and repair the damage at Kapichira Hydro Power Station which supplies about 129.6 megawatts (MW) to the national grid.

Egenco chief executive officer William Liabunya said this on Saturday during a tour at the station by the newly-appointed Minister of Energy Ibrahim Matola to appreciate the damage at the power station.

The station, located in

 Chikwawa District, suffered extensive damage, particularly at its intake dam following the flooding of the Shire River due to Tropical Storm Ana. This has forced Egenco to shut down the power station.

Liabunya said the repair of the damage to the dam structure, which is part of the dam wall that was made to direct part of the water to the machine and the process of restoring the plant, is a costly and lengthy exercise.

He said: “The first step we need to take to get water to the machines is to construct that dyke. After that, we are looking at constructing a proper dam that we can separate the damaged part of the dam wall so that we can have water and, therefore, be able to generate power while we are doing other maintenance while the machines are running.

“We are estimating this at six months, but we have engaged a consultant to look into this in detail so the period can be more or less than six months. We have also estimated the cost, which will be verified by the consultant at K18 billion.” Liabunya said Egenco

does not have money for such restoration and repair works.

“We have since engaged our insurers and whatever they will give us is what we will say Egenco has for this because in our emergency management, we only do insurance and do not have an account for emergency purposes,” he said.

Matola called for collaborated efforts from local and international development partners to help finance repair works of the station, saying government has no adequate funds to finance the company.

He said: “As a country, we are facing many challenges due to, among other issues, the Coivd-19 pandemic as such we can only do little to help.

“We are thus pleading with our development partners to come in and help us solve this problem.”

Egenco supplies 442MW to the national grid from both hydro and diesel generators.

However, in the absence of Kapichira Power Station, only 312MW will be generated.

To reduce the impact of the power supply gap, Liabuanya said the company is looking at additional standby power on top of the diesel generators to minimise the supply deficit.

“We have diesel generators that are running, of course some have broken down but we have pushed for spares to restore them.

“We also have a project which we should soon be launching for the combined gas turbines which will provide 50 megawatts to the nation,” he said