NAMIBIA – The municipality of Windhoek, Namibia has launched a call for expressions of interest for the financing, construction and operation of a 25 MWp solar photovoltaic plant.

The Independent Power Producers (IPPs) interested in the tender have until 19 August 2021 to submit their bids.

The municipality intends to rely on an independent power producer (IPP) to install a solar photovoltaic plant in a public-private partnership (PPP) with the city for a period of 25 years.

The power purchase agreement (PPA) that will be signed for this project is in line with the provisions of the modified single buyer rule (MSB) which was enacted in 2019 to allow large electricity consumers to source 30% of their requirement directly from IPP or generate it themselves.

The Windhoek municipality estimates that the project will require an investment of US$28.2 million to implement.

Much of the electricity consumed in Windhoek is supplied by NamPower and the state-owned company also sources its power from IPPs that operate several solar and wind farms in the country.

This is the case for CIGenCo, the subsidiary of Consolidated Infrastructure Group that built the 10 MWp Ejuva (2) solar photovoltaic plants.

In Rosh Pinah in the ǁKaras province in southern Namibia, Old Mutual Investment Group Namibia is the majority shareholder of a solar PV plant that feeds 5 MWp into the NamPower grid.

In April 2021, the governments of Namibia and Botswana virtually signed a Memorandum of Intent (MoI) for the implementation of their 5,000 MWp mega solar project.

Both countries received support from the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (BIRD), the African Development Bank (AfDB), as well as the US government’s Power Africa initiative for the project.

The agreements will allow the pre-feasibility studies for this clean energy mega-project to begin.

The first phase of the project could be subject to a call for tenders of 300 MWp to 500 MWp to meet the domestic demand of the two countries while the second phase is planned to produce between 500 MWp and 1,000 MWp.

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