Electricity Generation Company (EGENCO) is yet to begin reconstruction works at the 129.6 Megawatt Kapichira Power Station as blackouts lasting over six hours a day continue to hit Malawi.
EGENCO yesterday released a statement on progress made in the power generation restoration efforts at the Kapichira Power Station whose intake dam structure was destroyed earlier this year by Cyclone ANA.
In order to restore power, EGENCO wants to ‘temporarily’ reconstruct a cofferdam around the mouth of the damaged fuse plug and redirect water to the intake to resume power generation.
However, these works are yet to start and so far the company has only identified designers and contractor of the cofferdam.
The design is also yet to be completed and it is estimated that it will take about two months to complete the process of design and review of the cofferdam.
“To cut on time, EGENCO has agreed with the funders, World Bank, once designs are complete, the construction work are expected to last 55 days. In a nutshell, it is expected that by the end of December, power generation will resume at Kapichira,” the company said.
According to the company, energy experts from World Bank, based in USA and dam experts from Korea have been in the country since last week to finalize preparatory works for commencement of reconstruction.
The temporary works are expected to be completed by December this year after which EGENCO will move on to the second phase which involves reconstruction of dam structure based on an improved design that will be resilient to the frequent floods the country is experiencing as a result of climate change and catchment area degradation.
This work will further involve redesigning of the whole dam structure and spillway gates to make it more resilient.
“Phase two works will resume immediately after resumption of power generation and is expected to take 36 months.
“We have not engaged a contractor yet but we expect to engage one through the World Bank,” EGENCO said.
For over five months, people in the country have been experiencing blackouts lasting over six hours. These blackouts have affected businesses which are already operating in tough economic conditions following the devaluation of the Malawi Kwacha and the rise in costs of imports.
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