Mining & Trade News

The Electricity Generation Company (EGENCO) will from September 8th to 10th host the 2019 African Hydro Symposium (AHS) at the newly built Sunbird Mount Soche Hotel’s SocheInternational Conference Centre in Blantyre.

The theme for this year’s symposium, which is the 29th, is “Quality Power for Sustainable Development in Africa.

Senior Public Relations Officer for EGENCO Moses Gwaza says in a Press Statement that EGENCO is currently inviting various organizations and individuals in the country to participate in the symposium which is a beneficial platform for sharing vital information with foreign hydro energy experts.

“The symposium which is held annually, is a regional forum where hydro power plant operating experts              representing various electricity utilities and Independent Power Producers (IPPs) in Africa, meet to share experiences and deliberate on developments, operations, maintenance and management of hydro power plants in the continent,” Gwaza explains.

He says the meeting will attract approximately 150 delegates from power utilities across Africa and some international stakeholders from various energy sectors, equipment manufacturers and suppliers from Europe, Asia and America.

Gwaza says the hosting of the great conference is a collaboration of both EGENCO and the Secretariat of the African Hydro Symposium based at Kafue Gorge Regional Training Centre in Zambia.

He urges organizations wishing to participate as joint sponsors and organizations in the power and related industries to register their individual employees as delegates to attend the symposium.

Meanwhile, various companies and organizations in the country have come up to provide financial assistance to the event.

The companies include the NICO Group which donated K4.5-million to the power utility for the event, which will explore strategies to develop the energy sector for economic growth.

EGENCO CEO William Liabunya thanked NICO for the support saying it manifests that the insurance company is a good corporate citizen who want to help EGENCO overcome the country’s power     generation woes.

The symposium will provide a room for sharing of viable ideas to move Africa’s electricity access from an average of 30 to 35%.

EGENCO was founded in 2017 as an electricity generation utility after the unbundling of the Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom) into two entities with Escom responsible for power transmission and distribution.

The company, which recently launched its strategic plan, has planned a number of power generation projects including the construction of Mpatamanga hydro plant on Shire River.

EGENCO is seeking financing to execute the US$473-miillion project which will be supplying 309 MW to the national power grid.

German Consulting firm, Fichtner GmbH and CO KG, already conducted a feasibility study for the project with funding from the World Bank as part of the Energy Sector Support Project.

Besides Mpatamanga project, EGENCO is also sourcing funds for three other generation projects including the 138MW Kholombidzo Hydroelectric Power Plant which will be constructed on the Shire River upstream of Zalewa Bridge.

The US$511.5-million plant to be constructed over a period of 5.5 years will be uppermost in the cascade of the hydro-plants in the river.

Egenco is also planning to construct the 180MW Songwe Hydropower Plant on Songwe River through        cooperation between the Governments of Malawi and Tanzania.

The utility is also working on the expansion of Wvowe Mini Hydropower Scheme to add 4.5MW to the power grid.

EGENCO also plans to install a solar PV plant close to a load center at Nanjoka in Salima to maximize benefits to the national grid and satisfy the afternoon peak demand. The project scopes installation of a 20MW solar power plant to increase the generation capacity and introduce a diverse power mix in the generation system.

Trash interruption is the one of the contributing factors hindering power generation in the country so EGENCO is also conducting trash river diversion projects in many power stations on the Shire River.

In September 2017, the company commenced an 18 months project of dredging and diverting a tributary that was depositing a lot of slit at the Tedzani intake pond, a project that consumed about MK5-billion.

With funding from the US government energy compact through the Millennium Challenge Corporation, in January 2019 EGENCO acquired a brand new dredger for Kapichira power station to remove silt which covered over 70% of the generating dam.

Siltation lowers the water levels in the dams making it difficult to generate electricity matching the demand.

Currently the country has 406.6MW installed generation capacity but only 335.15MW is available to cater for 18.63 million people.

The utility’s hydro-power plants include Nkula A and B, Kapichira I and II, Tedzani I, II and III and Wovwe. 

EGENCO is also planning to construct a coal fired power plant as one way of diversifying the power sources.

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