The financial partners of the Kaptis hydropower project are now known. They are FinnFund, a Finnish company specialising in development finance. It will invest in the project alongside Ninety One SA (formerly Investec Asset Management) of Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (EAIF), a fund owned by Private Infrastructure Development Group (PIDG).
FinnFund and EAIF/Ninety One SA will provide the loan liquidity for the construction of the Kaptis hydropower plant in Western Kenya. “I am pleased to welcome EAIF/Ninety One and FinnFund into our consortium for the actual construction of Kaptis. Both lenders are major players in the African infrastructure sector with specific knowledge. They have successfully demonstrated their skills in financing small hydropower projects in sub-Saharan Africa”, says Raphael Khalifa, the founder of Tembo Power, a company based in Ebene, Mauritius, and the project sponsor.
The commissioning of the hydropower plant is scheduled for 2022
The Kaptis hydropower project is being developed by a consortium formed by Tembo Power (40%), Metier Private Equity International (40%), a South African-based company specialising in financing renewable energy and energy efficiency in Africa, and WK Construction (20%). Implementation of the project will require an investment of $30 million. These three partners will inject $14 million in equity.
According to Tembo Power, the financial closing of the project will take place before the end of the year, allowing the project to enter its construction phase. Kaptis is a run-of-river power plant, a hydroelectric facility that operates without a reservoir. The plant, which will be commissioned in 2022, will have a capacity of 15 MW. The electricity will be fed into the grid of the state-owned Kenya Power (KPLC) under a power purchase agreement signed with the consortium.
Jean Marie Takouleu