The Winners Are Set to Be Announced for the Energy Storage Awards!

Energy Storage Awards, 21 November 2024, Hilton London Bankside

Scatec and EDF to develop 7GWh pumped hydro plant in Malawi

LinkedIn
Twitter
Reddit
Facebook
Email

Renewable developer Scatec and energy group EDF have signed a binding agreement with the government of Malawi to develop a hydropower plant with 309MW/7,000MWh of pumped hydro energy storage.

The agreement has been signed under the country’s Public Private Partnership (PPP) framework and officially awards the role of project lead developer to a consortium composed of Scatec and EDF. The World Bank group’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) helped with early-stage project development and funded the launch of the competitive tender.

This article requires Premium SubscriptionBasic (FREE) Subscription

Enjoy 12 months of exclusive analysis

  • Regular insight and analysis of the industry’s biggest developments
  • In-depth interviews with the industry’s leading figures
  • Annual digital subscription to the PV Tech Power journal
  • Discounts on Solar Media’s portfolio of events, in-person and virtual

Or continue reading this article for free

The project, called the Mpatamanga hydropower plant, is on the Shire River at Mpatamanga Gorge in the south of the country in between two existing hydropower plants. It will comprise a 309MW pumped hydro energy storage (PHES) plant, or ‘peaking’ plant, and a 41MW downstream run-of-river plant.

Although it did not reveal the discharge duration or energy capacity of the pumped hydro portion, an earlier USAID document which included information about the project said that “…the inclusion of the plant’s reservoir is equivalent to introducing a 7,000MWh battery system into the grid…”. This implies a roughly 22-hour duration system. The only disparity is that the earlier document said it would have 310MW of power, not 309MW.

USAID’s document added that the project will take 52 months to build (four years and four months) though a construction start date has not been revealed.

The 309MW plant will provide energy during peak demand hours of the day and help with overall grid stability by ramping up and down production, a press release said.

“The 350 MW Mpatamanga hydropower project will not only double the installed capacity of hydropower in Malawi, but also improve power supply security, provide opportunities for increased renewable energy generation capacity in the country and contribute to controlling the flow of the Shire River downstream of the power plant,” said the Minister of Energy in Malawi, Ibrahim Matola.

The project was designated a national priority and the lowest cost expansion alternative in the country’s integrated resource plan for 2017. Consultancy Mott MacDonald was tasked with providing a final Environmental and Social Impact Assessment and Biodiversity Action Plan. Some 90 households will be displaced due to the flooding caused by the creation of the upper reservoir.

It is the second major energy storage project that has progressed in the landlocked country in the last few months. In July, the World Bank provided US$24 million in guarantees for a 20MW solar-plus-storage project which entered commercial operations in May this year, as reported by Energy-Storage.news.

Read Next

November 12, 2024
Developer Rolwind has won a favourable environmental impact assessment (EIA) result for a 200MW/800MWh BESS in Spain, the first standalone one to do so and the largest in the country, it claimed.
November 12, 2024
National deployment targets should be set for energy storage technologies, the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) Coalition for Action has said.
November 12, 2024
Energy generator and retailer Alinta Energy has penned an early contractor agreement for the 7.2GWh Oven Mountain pumped hydro energy storage (PHES) project in New South Wales, Australia.
November 11, 2024
Large-scale energy storage reaching financial commitment increased 95% year-on-year in Australia in Q3 2024, reaching just under 4GWh.
November 8, 2024
The Australian Energy Regulator (AER) said increased energy storage capacity will be essential to manage daily and seasonal variations in output on the National Electricity Market (NEM).

Most Popular

Email Newsletter