AFC reinforces commitment to Africa’s energy sector

Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) is reaffirming its commitment to President Obama’s Power Africa initiative with its participation in the Powering Africa Summit.

The three-day summit, to be held in Washington DC, begins on Wednesday.

A statement from AFC said the AFC delegation, headed by the Senior Vice President of Power, Batchi Baldeh, would showcase the AFC’s transformative power projects at the summit and demonstrate the significant impact that the work of the AFC was having on the sector.

Mr Baldeh, the statement said, would be a panelist of the discussion on: “The Relationship between Project Developers, host Governments and the DFIs”, on Friday, 30 January.

This discussion, it said, would take place the day after the inauguration of one of AFC’s most innovative and significant financing projects, the USD900 million Kpone Independent Power Plant (Kpone IPP).

The project is set to be unveiled in Ghana this week at a groundbreaking ceremony to be attended by Vice President Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, Minister of Power Dr Kwabena Donkor, and Robert Dwamena, Managing Director of the Electricity Company of Ghana.

Kpone IPP is being implemented by Cenpower Generation Company Limited with AFC as the lead project developer, mandated lead arranger, and largest equity investor in the project, which reached financial close in December 2014, the statement said.

“In completing the transaction, AFC has achieved all its obligations under the Power Africa Initiative and has been recognised by the Thomson Reuters PFI Awards as the ‘African Power Deal of the Year’ for 2014,” the statement said.

Ahead of the summit, Mr Baldeh commented on the pressing need to address the region’s power deficit, it said. “The significant shortfall in power generation capacity is currently restraining the economic development of Sub Saharan Africa.”

“When KIPP comes on-stream fully in 2017, it is expected to increase Ghana’s dependable installed generation capacity by 13% and supply power to approximately 1 million households,”it said.

“It is through landmark projects like KIPP and influential initiatives such as Power Africa that millions of Africans will be able to fulfill their true potential.”

President Obama announced a renewed commitment to Power Africa at the US- Africa Leaders’ Summit in August last year.

African stakeholders would meet today in Washington with the goal of improving capacity by 30,000 MW and increasing electricity access by at least 60 million new households and businesses across all of Sub-Saharan Africa, it said.