The 17th edition of the Conference & Exhibition of Energy and Oil in Africa (SIEPA) kicked off in Dakar on Tuesday to discuss “the future of Senegal’s energy value chain”, APA reports here.
Organized by the Association for the Development of Energy in Africa, in collaboration with the Association of Senegal for Energy Development in Africa (ASDEA) and AME TRADE Ltd, the meeting brings together 41 presenters from the oil and gas industry to discuss new perspectives on energy and hydrocarbons, as well as the strategy to adopt following major discoveries of oil and gas off the country’s coast.
Planned to take place until June 13, the meeting will address various topics related, among others, to the role of traders and financiers in the oil sector, the development of production capacity, the place of renewable energy in public policies, etc.
Presiding over the opening ceremony, the Chief of Staff of the Energy and Oil Minister, Abdoulaye Dia, hailed the idea of holding the event in Dakar and recalled the vision of the state regarding electricity.
According to Mr. Dia, this consists in satisfying demand at the lowest cost, through the use of local gas in a “Gas to Power” strategy put in place by the Senegalese state, which has the effect of protecting the electricity sector from external shocks related to changes in the price of commodities, such as oil.
“We want to get out of the oil tyranny but also diversify the composition of electric power generation by improving the energy mix,” he said.
Dia also stressed that the state intends to improve the “financial viability” of the sector and companies in the country, in order to reduce or eliminate subsidies to consumers for the freezing of tariffs, and to provide sufficient resources to achieve universal access to electricity by 2025.
Similarly, the government is considering an industrial and institutional transformation of the sector with the donation of $600 million as part of the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA), Mr. Dia concluded.
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