- ZESCO declares a surplus power capacity of 1000MW.
Zambia’s integrated power utility ZESCO has announced that the country now has a surplus capacity of about 1,000 megawatts (MW) at a time the country is also enjoying an economic rebound. According to ZESCO Managing Director Engr Victor Mapani, the installed national generation capacity stands at 3,456.8 MW compared to a peak national demand of approximately 2,300MW.
Victor Mapani made this known during a high-level panel discussion at the ongoing Association of Power Utilities of Africa (APUA) meeting in Dakar, Senegal.
“We thus have a surplus of 1,156.8 MW that is available for trade within the interconnected SAPP network,” Eng. Mapani said.
He also said that ZESCO was using internally generated resources to progress the 750 MW Kafue Gorge Lower (KGL) hydro project, which was being constructed at approximately $2.3 billion and will be completed later this year in November.
“Currently, four out of five units are already commissioned and running. We expect to commission the last 150 MW machine, unit 5, by November this year.”