- In a meeting of the Council of Ministers, the government of Ethiopia approved the power purchase agreement signed with Corbetti Geothermal.
- Corbetti Geothermal, in a four way partnership will develop an initial 300MW capacity.
- This announcement was made by Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed in a Facebook post
The Power Purchase agreement for the first time engages the Ethiopian Electric Power and Ethiopian Engineering Authority on one side, and the Corbetti and Tulu Moye companies on the other side in a public private contract. The Ethiopian Power company provides guarantees as the off-taker.
Ministry of Water, Irrigation and Energy’s EEP, EEA on one hand & Corbetti and Tulu Moye companies on the other will develop total of 300 MW Geothermal Power as Public Private Partnership. The geothermal sector and skills in Ethiopia will tap in to this green, clean and renewable energy source to increase energy capacity, security and reliability of Ethiopia. Geothermal provides great baseline constant output power to support our industrialization and continued economic growth.
Project History
Corbetti geothermal power project is a is a large-scale project being developed in the Corbetti Caldera region of Ethiopia. At an estimated to cost USD 4 billion, it is the first privately financed geothermal venture in Ethiopia.
Development of the project commenced in 2011 by Reykjavik Geothermal, which attained the necessary concessions and licenses from the Ethiopian authorities. In 2014, Berkley Energy and Iceland Drilling joined the project followed by InfraCo Africa in 2015. Berkley Energy owns majority interest in the project through the Africa Renewable Energy Fund.
The three investors established a new energy company named Corbetti Geothermal to develop the project in multiple phases.
The project is being developed as part of the Power Africa Initiative, which aims to add 10GW of cleaner energy to six countries on priority in sub-saharan Africa. Once fully complete, it is expected to have a capacity of more than 1000MW.
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
