Africa’s largest solar and storage agreement awaits financial close before the year ends

Scatec signed a 25-year dollar-denominated agreement with Egypt’s transmission company in January covering 1.95GW of solar and 3.9GWh of batteries. Capital expenditure, engineering scope and financing structure are still undisclosed. The company expects to close in the second half of this year.

Financial close on the largest solar and battery installation contracted in Africa is expected before the end of 2026, with capital expenditure, engineering scope and financing structure all to be disclosed at that point.

The agreement behind it was signed on 11 January, when the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company entered a 25-year, dollar-denominated, pay-as-produced power purchase agreement with Scatec for 1.95GW of solar and 3.9GWh of battery storage at Minya, under the Valley for Sustainable Energy programme. One integrated hybrid of roughly 1.7GW is designed to deliver around-the-clock renewable baseload generating about 6,000GWh a year, with two standalone battery projects providing grid stability and support services. Scatec is lead developer and holds engineering, procurement and construction, asset management and operations and maintenance, with additional equity partners still to be invited.

A second agreement signed the same day covers the manufacturing side. China’s Sungrow will build a factory in the Suez Canal Economic Zone producing energy storage batteries, part of whose output supplies the Minya project. Both are being implemented with the Ministry of Electricity and Renewable Energy and the Suez Canal Economic Zone Authority, and the two together total around US$1.9 billion.

Attaching a factory to a signed offtake agreement gives a manufacturer demand it can finance against. The continent currently has no significant domestic manufacturing for energy storage components.

Egypt has been assembling the conditions for several years. Scatec reached financial close on the US$590 million Obelisk hybrid at 1.1GW of solar with 100MW and 200MWh of storage in mid-2025, with the first phase due to reach commercial operation in the first half of this year. Egypt launched its first utility-scale battery in 2025, a 300MWh facility at a 500MW solar plant in Aswan, and has committed more than a billion dollars to its transmission network.

Scatec Chief Executive Terje Pilskog has said the agreement supports Egypt’s transition by delivering round-the-clock renewable power and enhancing grid stability.

Photos: Scatec