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Botswana’s first utility-scale solar plant has its financing, and the electricity is destined for the regional market rather than the domestic one. Rand Merchant Bank underwrote the package on a pure market view into SAPP, where the regional deficit sits at around 4,200MW and is concentrated in Zambia and the DRC.

The 150MW Quipungo project in Huila province was the first site signed under Project Royal Sable, in an agreement with the state transmission company in January. The remaining two sites have no offtake in place. Completed, the programme would reach around 300,000 homes. Masdar has contracted one of the three sites in Project Royal Sable, […]

ESCOM switched on a 20MW and 40 megawatt hour system in Lilongwe in July, funded by a US$20 million grant. The utility had been curtailing renewable generation it had already produced and running diesel instead. William Kayipa says the arithmetic changes from here.