Why Zimbabwe is in the dark and what it is doing about it

In the long term?

Unit 7 at Hwange is above 95%. Commissioning of the different circuits have started. We expect this unit to supply a commercial load of 300MW onto the system by end of November. Unit 8 will come in by the end of the first quarter in 2023.

Unit 7 is critical because it will bring us 300MW. The current units have been coming on and off, so we will continue to limp, but the supply-demand gap will get closer.

After we bring in the 600MW (from Units 7&8), we will be more stable. But we recognise that there is demand which is increasing. So we have not stopped building new capacity. We have the private sector implementing solar projects.

What about renewable energy and Independent Power Producers?

We have about 10MW coming from solar.

We have facilitated access to funding in the form of prescribed asset status to ensure IPPs access funding locally. There have been challenges to secure funding for such projects due to various issues related to the country.

Soon, we will be launching a procurement process for new capacity and have a solar integration plan, which includes storage.

We then have small hydro-plants; Pungwe and Tsanga. Together, they are doing 5MW. At this time of the year, most mini-hydros go into maintenance because water levels are low.

We have 12MW from Gwanda waiting to be put online. PPC is building 30MW, which they will bring in by early next year. Zhonxin (thermal plant in Hwange) is doing about 30MW. Hippo Valley is supplying about 7MW.

Is Zimbabwe importing power?

We are importing 85MW from Eskom (South Africa), 50MW from HCB (Mozambique) and 100MW from Zesco (Zambia) on a prepayment agreement.

Imports are constrained. We have a firm agreement with Eskom of up to 85MW and a non-firm agreement of up to 300MW. Usually, we would have gone to take that additional 300MW. But, at the moment, because of their own internal challenges, they are not able to do so.

We had demand of 1700MW and projecting (supply) 1345MW of power including imports.-NewZWire

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