Angola last year added the largest capacity to its hydropower stock in Africa, followed by Uganda and Ethiopia.
Angola added 334 megawatts (MW) of hydropower in 2019, while Uganda expanded its capacity by 260MW, according to a new report by International Hydropower Association (IHA). Hydropower is a clean, low-cost renewable energy source.
Ethiopia, which has retained its top spot as the largest hydropower producer on the continent, added 254MW last year – the third largest expansion.
“In Angola, the Lauca project commissioned one more turbine in 2019, making it the largest hydropower plant in the country with 1,670 MW of installed capacity. The remaining 401MW is expected to be commissioned in 2020,” reads the report.
The IHA report indicates that Ethiopia remains the top hydropower producer in Africa with an installed capacity of 4,074 MW.
Second is South Africa (3,596 MW), followed by Angola (3,435 MW), Egypt (2,876 MW) while DR Congo is fifth.
Uganda has a total hydropower capacity of 1,040 MW and is ranked at position 13 in Africa, with its neighbours Kenya (826MW) and Tanzania (586MW) coming in at position 13 and 17 respectively.
“In Uganda, two storage hydropower projects, Isimba (183.2 MW) and Achwa II (42 MW) were officially commissioned in 2019. Moreover, a total of 35.25 MW of additional capacity was added in 2019 under the Global Energy Transfer for Feed-in-Tariff (GET FiT) Programme,” the report says.
Tanzania mid-last year launched construction of Stiegle’s Gorge also known as Julius Nyerere hydropower station which will have a capacity of 2,100MW upon completion. Likewise, Uganda is expected to commission Karuma dam (600MW) in November 2020 – its biggest hydropower project.
In early 2020, Ethiopian Electric Power announced the commissioning of the Genale Dawa III project with a total installed capacity of 254.1 MW.
Hydropower remains the main renewable resource in Africa with over 37,000 MW of installed capacity. In 2019, the continent added 906 MW of hydropower to existing fleet.
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