Senegal ends gas imports in 2026 on a CFA140 billion annual saving
Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko has said Senegal stops importing natural gas this year, replaced by domestic output from Sangomar and Greater Tortue Ahmeyim. Gas would then carry three quarters of installed capacity. Neither Senelec nor the regulator has published a tariff position for the period after imports stop.
Senegal spends CFA140 billion a year importing natural gas, around $227 million, and Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko has said that spending ends in 2026. Domestic output from the Sangomar field and the cross-border Greater Tortue Ahmeyim project takes its place.
GTA Phase 1 allocates roughly 35 million standard cubic feet a day to each host country, Senegal and Mauritania, for domestic power generation. Authorities expect between 20 and 25 per cent of Phase 1 output to serve the Senegalese market by 2027. The government’s strategy has gas reaching 75 per cent of installed capacity, carried by the conversion of the 335MW Bel Air plant and a new 366MW facility.
Construction on the GTA-Gandon section was approved by Senegal’s Regional Development Committee in May, 85 kilometres of which 45 are offshore and 40 onshore, connecting the GTA terminal to a planned 250 to 300MW gas plant at Gandon near Saint-Louis. It forms the northern end of the 2.5 billion cubic metre Senegal Gas Network, with extensions planned to Tobène, Cap des Biches, Sendou and Malicounda across a route eventually running 300 to 400 kilometres to Dakar.
State company Petrosen has a $100 million onshore exploration programme for 2026 aimed at frontier basins thought to mirror the offshore geology. The sovereign wealth fund FONSIS doubled its capital to $280 million early in the year to mobilise private investment into gas infrastructure and future licensing rounds.
Public electricity subsidies reached $455 million in 2023 and Senegalese households continue to pay comparatively high tariffs. Neither Senelec nor the regulator CRSE has published a tariff position for the period after the imports stop.
