Egypt’s New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA) has inaugurated Africa’s largest wind farm to date, a 200MW project at Gebel El Zeit on the Gulf of Suez. German development bank KfW lent NREA €192mn to help fund the project, which it said cost €340mn ($360mn) in total. The European Investment Bank provided a further €50mn and the European Commission €30mn.
The project was slowed by the 2011 ‘Arab Spring’ uprising and subsequent political turbulence, a Ministry of Electricity and Energy official told reporters. Project go-ahead was given in late 2008 and the financing deal was concluded in December 2010. Completion of the farm raises Egypt’s claimed wind capacity to 950MW. (CONTINUED - 286 WORDS)
