In The News: 10MW Solar Power For Zimbabwe’s National Grid

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Distributed Power Africa (DPA) announced plans to install solar power stations within the next 12 months which will add 10 megawatt peak (MW) of electricity to Zimbabwe’s national grid soon thereafter.

In an article written by Kenneth Nyavaya, DPA development executive, Remeredzai Kuhudzai stated that DPA will supervise and train local workers during the installation phase and thereby create job opportunities.

“The response to our projects so far is very positive and we have a pipeline of projects of more than 10MW to be rolled out over the next 12 months. Our initial target is more than 10MW installed by end of 2018,” he said.

“This will be linked to offering the full extent of services, covering value engineering during the design stage, innovative financial models, end-to-end project methodologies, standards base construction, quality control during and before the site is commissioned, mature operational management, with the best online monitoring and O&M services (covering remedial and preventative maintenance). All of this will be linked to our world-class monitoring and management to deliver what we termed smart energy.”

Zimbabwe has one of the best solar radiation belts in the world and averages 2 100 kilowatt hours per square metre p/a and 3 000 hours of sunshine per year. This makes solar power not only viable but essential.

“The market opportunity for solar energy development is huge in a country like Zimbabwe that has abundant sunlight, but the energy is underutilised. The country can be a leader in the renewable energy space by adding significant solar electricity into the generation mix and could become potentially a net exporter of power to the continent,” Kuhudzai added. “Zimbabwe is currently facing a power generation deficit of around 400MW and this is covered by imports from neighbouring countries.”

If you want to read the full story released on Zimbabwe’s Newsday, you can do so here.


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