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Namibia: Ruacana Turbine Upgrade Still On Despite Rising Costs
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The Namibian (Windhoek)
14 May 2008
Posted to the web 14 May 2008
Brigitte Weidlich
Windhoek
THE cost to install a fourth turbine at the Ruacana hydropower station on the Kunene River has increased by N$50 million in barely five months - from N$350 to N$400 million.
According to John Kaimu, Marketing and Communications Manager at NamPower, rising prices of commodities like oil and metals necessitated adjustment of the cost calculations.
NamPower has decided to install a fourth turbine at the hydropower station to increase its generation capacity from the current 240 to 320 megawatt.
A tender was advertised earlier this year and international bidders have expressed interest, Kaimu said.
The long-mooted fourth turbine has now become more urgent amidst a regional electricity supply crisis, which developed last year after South Africa, which is the largest power provider with 38 000 megawatt, reduced exports to its neighbours due to local demand outstripping supply.
"The installation [of the fourth turbine] is envisaged to be completed by the end of 2010 for the new rainy season so we can make full use of the rising water levels of the Kunene River," Kaimu told a group of reporters who were flown to Ruacana last weekend.
Ruacana was constructed in the seventies and started to generate electricity from 1980 onwards.
"Since that investment is fully paid, electricity from there is quite cheap and only because of Ruacana can we cross-subsidise electricity tariffs for bulk customers and consumers, otherwise they would have to fork out even more," the NamPower official said during a tour of the station, which was built inside a cliff overlooking the Ruacana Falls.
Although Ruacana can only be used for six or seven months of the year, depending on rainfall, it provides the bulk of electricity for Namibia, Kaimu said.
NamPower has appointed NorPlan Consulting Engineers & HydroPower Planners from Norway as technical advisers for the project.
The Ruacana hydropower station could never run on full capacity, because the Gove storage dam in Angola that was built to regulate the flow of the Kunene River was damaged, resulting in the turbines not running all year around.
A smaller and second dam at Calueque about 65 kilometres upstream from Ruacana, intended for final regulation of the river flow downstream, was also constructed, but never completed because of the civil war in Angola.
Recently, the Angolan government indicated it was interested in rehabilitating both the Gove and Calueque dams.
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This would regulate water flow for Namibia's Ruacana power station so that it can generate a constant flow of electricity.
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