Nigerian power company Egbin Power is reportedly planning to raise $1.18bn in order to increase its electricity generation capacity.
Bloomberg reported that the company aims to more than double its power generation capacity to 3,000MW to boost its local power supply, as well as exporting the increased power output to the West African countries.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Egbin Power expects to sell the power through the West Africa Power Pool, an entity of the Economic Community of West African States that aims to set up a common power market for the region.
Through a combination of debt and equity, the company is planning to arrange the funding before beginning construction works in the second quarter of next year.
In an email, the firm told Bloomberg: “The plan is to raise the fund to be available to kick off.”
Egbin Power did not disclose the details of the funding arrangements that it is planning to make.
The company, owned by Sahara Group, plans to construct the second phase of its 1,320MW power plant.
Egbin Power intends to begin the first phase of the expansion project next year, starting with the construction of open-cycle turbines and finishing with a closed cycle by 2025.
The company acquired the power plant in 2013, after the Nigerian government divested the country’s state-owned electricity generation and distribution assets to private companies.
Although Nigeria has 13,000MW of installed electricity-production capacity, only around 4,500MW of this is transmitted to the grid daily, primarily due to dilapidated electricity transmission infrastructure.
The government is now looking at divesting its transmission network to boost its capacity.
Last October, it was reported that there were 35 tenders announced in the Middle East and Africa’s solar technology market. This marked a 21% increase over the last four-quarter average of 29.
