Senegalese business leaders have decided to set up a 300-megawatt gas power plant, at a total cost of 227 billion CFA francs.
The national private sector is finally getting involved. The West Africa Energy (WAE) consortium, made up of Senegalese businessmen, has undertaken to build this energy infrastructure at Cap des Biches in Rufisque, east of Dakar. It will be operational in 2022.
Headed by the former Minister of Energy under Wade, Samuel Sarr, the WAE Company is also composed of Harouna Dia and Abdoulaye Dia, known in the agri-food sector, as well as Khadim Ba, active in the oil sector.
Present at the foundation stone-laying ceremony, as reported by several local media such as Sud Quotidien, the Minister of Petroleum and Energy, Sophie Gladima, said that the realisation of this project will mark the “largest gas power plant in Senegal and West Africa.”
Welcoming the initiative, she noted that “this ceremony comes in a context where energy, the main driver of PAP 2, with electricity produced from gas, as part of the Gas to Power strategy, is elevated to the rank of national priority for universal access by 2025. The PAP 2 or priority action plan is the second phase of the Emerging Senegal Plan (PSE), the governance policy of President Macky Sall, and runs from 2019-2023.
“We are therefore in the process of making a great qualitative leap for our country in relation to the national private sector in its role as an engine of growth,” Ms Gladima noted.
“This project will enable us to consolidate our production capacities while reducing fuel consumption thanks to the expected performance of the gas-fired production units. It will also play a big role in our carbon footprint. It is therefore our way of contributing, beyond the energy mix achieved in the sector, to the fight against global warming,” the Minister added.
For his part, Director Samuel Sarr praised the attitude of his partners and compatriots of West Africa Energy who “have mobilised 27 billion CFA francs with Coris Bank International.”
The Senegalese consortium was also “able to obtain financing with its financial partner Africa Finance Corporation to the tune of 200 billion CFA francs, of which 85 billion and the rest through syndication with two other financial partners including the prestigious Afrixim Bank,” he said.
ODL/te/lb/abj/APA