
The African Development Bank (AfDB) has stated that it intends to provide $1 billion in help to Nigeria’s electrical industry.
At the Eight Africa Energy MarketPlace (AEMP) Forum in Abuja on Thursday, Dr. Kevin Kariuki, Vice President, Power, Energy, Climate Change and Green Growth Complex, AfDB, made this statement.
The United Kingdom Nigeria Infrastructure Advisory Facility (UKNIAF), the Ministry of Power, and the African Development Bank (AfDB) organized the forum.
The National Integrated Electricity Policy and Strategic Implementation Plan (NIEP-SIP) is a policy dialogue with the theme “Towards Nigeria’s Sustainable Energy Future: Policy, Regulation and Investment.”
Kariuki said: “We will be shortly seeking board approval for a one billion dollars policy-based operation (PBO) with a significant energy component.
“This is aimed at supporting the ongoing power sector reforms triggered by the new Electricity Act.
“The timing of the AEMP and the proposed policy-based lending focused on the energy sector is, therefore, not coincidental.
“We will finance the policy recommendations to actualize the expected outcomes from the National Integrated Electricity Policy and Strategic Implementation Plan.”
He said that good policies attracted sustainable investments, adding that enabling environment would maximize the value of ongoing investments, including the 256.2 million dollars Nigeria Transmission Expansion Project.
According to him, the project entailed the construction of 500 Kilometres (KM) of transmission lines and four substations with a capacity of over 1000 Mega Volt Ampree (MVA).
According to AfDB vice president, this portends great promise for increasing the proportion of renewable energy in Nigeria’s energy mix.
He said that through the multi-prong approach of supporting policy development, financing critical power sector infrastructure, and providing technical assistance and capacity building would be achieved.
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