African Union and Reykjavik Geothermal sign grant agreement
Corbetti Caldera, Ethiopia (source: Reykjavik Geothermal)
Alexander Richter
26 May 2014
Reykjavik Geothermal and the African Union signed a grant contract for an amount of up to $8 million as part of the GRMF for the drilling of two wells of the Corbetti geothermal power project in Ethiopia at an international donor meeting in Reykjavik, Iceland.
This morning, Reykjavik Geothermal and the African Union have signed a contract granting support for the drilling of the geothermal project of Reykjavik Geothermal in Ethiopia.
The contract was signed in conjunction with an international donor meeting for geothermal development in East Africa.
The grant is awarded as part of the Geothermal Risk Mitigation Facility (GRMF), that is intended to mitigate risk in geothermal drilling for geothermal in Eastern Africa.
The facility is led by the African Union, which is funded by the Ministry of Development in Germany and the European Infrastructure Fund for Africa in collaboration with the German Development Bank .
The grant of up to $8 million now received by Reykjavik Geothermal will help the company to drill two geothermal wells for its Corbetti geothermal power project in Ethiopia.
Reykjavik Geothermal has agreed with the the Government of Ethiopia on the development of up to 1,000 MW in the Main Ethiopian Rift. It is expected that the project will be split in two phase development of 500 MW each.
The planned project will utilize geothermal energy from three different resources at Corbetti, Tulu Moyer and Abaya. The power of the planned plants will be sold to the state energy company of Ethiopia, Ethiopia Electric Power (EEP).
With the first plant, the annual power production is expected to deliver about 4,000 GWh to the national grid. The overall investment volume for both phases is expected at $4 billion.
The Icelandic Ministry for Foreign Affairs has been en energetic supporter of geothermal development in East Africa, having been instrumental in capacity building among the nations of the East African Rift Valley.
The International Donor Meeting now taking place in Reykjavik, Iceland is hosted by the African Union Commission and the International Development Bank.
“The agreement today was signed by Dr . ElhamMahmoud Ahmed Ibrahim , Director of Infrastructure and Energy of the African Union and Thorleifur Finnsson , the Head of Project Development at Reykjavik Geothermal.”, so reported by local news today.
Source: Visir.is
