The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Group, through its private sector window, approved on Wednesday, 19 May 2010 in Tunis a senior loan of EUR 15 million to Cabeólica wind power project in Cape Verde.
The project consists in the construction, operation and maintenance of four onshore wind farms on four islands of the Cape Verdean archipelago (Santiago, São Vicente, Sal, and Boa Vista). These will have a combined installed capacity of 25.5 MW and will be connected to the existing electricity grid on each island. Each wind farm will include towers with wind turbines, transformers, a substation, a command centre, an underground transmission line and an access road.
Cape Verde benefits from considerable wind and solar resources for power generation. The Government has set itself the target of increasing the penetration of renewable sources of energy to 50% by 2020.
Therefore the project will be a landmark transaction for the Cape Verdean economy as it will contribute to the development of the country’s legal framework for PPP structures. Moreover, it will enable the country to reduce its green house gas emissions and benefit from the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) by diversifying the generation resources and reducing the use of inefficient and expensive diesel generation units.
Cabeólica Wind Power project is in line with the Bank Group’s Country Strategy Paper for Cape Verde for the period of 2009–2012 which is founded on two pillars aimed at providing an enabling environment for accelerated growth and strengthening basic infrastructure. In addition, it is in line with the private sector strategy which sets infrastructure as a priority, targeting 40% of new operations.
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Onike Nicol-Houra
