Availability of Tanzania Electric Services to Improve

Tanzania Electric Supply Company (TANESCO) has released plans to invest USD 33.4 million in order to add a 134–kilometer high-voltage power transmission line to its current network, thus making it possible for the company to serve as many as 25,000 new customers.

In order for this plan to be realized, TANESCO has joined forces in a signed agreement with SAE Power Lines (Milan, Italy) and Associated Transrail Structures Limited (Milan), who will be responsible for the implementation of the project.

This new 132-kilovolt (kV) transmission network reinforcement project is one piece of the Tanzania Energy Development and Access Expansion Project (TEPAD).

Other pieces of the project include plans to construct 13 new distribution stations and to re-establish five existing substations as well as to begin improving the company’s current network, in part by replacing 60,000 credit meters with prepaid ones.

In addition, TANESCO plans to install solid-state meters with remote metering for 1,800 customers and to establish a technical service management system, a resource management system, a commercial management system, and a marketing department.

Currently, low network voltages combined with high energy losses in most regions has resulted in limited customer access to power, therefore, one of the aims of the project is to provide new households and businesses with more frequent access to the national power grid system.

Until now, Tanzania has not yet begun to generate surplus power, meaning that, should there be a breakdown in the power supply, the only available option is for the government to ration the power supply.

The current peak power demand of Tanzania stands at approximately 787 megawatts (MW) and a grid that is capable of supplying only 595 MW and it has been predicted that the power demand for the country will increase to 1,331 MW along with an increased overall capacity of 1,445 MW by 2014.

In order to meet the increasing demand of the country, TANESCO has calculated that the country would need to add at least 105 MW of power to its grid annually.

To this end, one of the primary goals in the formation and development of the TEPAD project is to improve the overall power services that are available in the country’s three major growth centers, including in and around the capital city of Dar es Salaam, the Mount Kilimanjaro and Arusha.

Included in the plans of the project is the investment in TANESCO’s current transmission and distribution network along with the extension of support to the Rural Energy Agency, and the guaranteed supply of the finances that are required both for project management and for technical assistance.

Estimate for the overall cost of the project, made by the World Bank in Washington, D.C., have priced the project at approximately USD 105 million.