Kapichira still at risk—committee
Parliamentary Committee on Natural Resources and Climate Change has cautioned that the 130 megawatt (MW) Kapichira Hydro Power Station in Chikwawa remains at risk of cyclones damage because the rehabilitation works were temporary.
Kapichira was out of operation for more than a year from January 2022 to April this year after Cyclone Ana severely damaged its dam structures, taking out 129.6MW or an equivalent of 23 percent of the country’s power supply off the national grid. The development triggered prolonged power rationing of up to 10 hours.
Electricity Generation Company (Egenco) Limited reopened the plant earlier this year, but the committee’s chairperson Werani Chilenga told Parliament in Lilongwe on Wednesday that another cyclone could undo the rehabilitation works.
In his presentation, he said: “The repairs that Egenco made to the Kapichira Power Plant are temporary. If another disaster strikes, then the damage could plunge the country into another devastating cycle of blackouts that cost the local economy dearly in the past year.”
He lamented the government’s delays to rehabilitate the power plant despite having funds from the Malawi Rural Electrification Programme at its disposal.
Said Chilenga: “Luckily, Egenco used its own funds to bring the plant back online. The K60 billion loan from the World Bank will then be used to erect a permanent structure that will be more resilient to climatic shocks.”
Reacting to the report, Machinga East member of Parliament Esther Jolobala (United Democratic Front) urged the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs and Ministry of Energy to take parliamentary committees’ reports seriously to avoid similar problems from resurfacing in the future.
In its July issue of the Malawi Economic Monitor, the World Bank observed that Malawi was lagging behind its regional peers, Tanzania and Mozambique, in terms of energy access, a development the bank said stifles local economic growth.
