Egypt’s Sisi launches national energy projects

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi yesterday inaugurated a number of national megaprojects in the electricity and energy sectors, local media reported.

Speaking at the inauguration ceremony, Al-Sisi said that the Ministry of Petroleum had “a prominent role in resolving the country’s electricity crisis and power cuts in 2014 through supplying power stations with the necessary gas for operations.”

“I swear, the ministry literally had to borrow to run the power stations across the country,” he said.

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During the ceremony, the Egyptian Minister of Electricity, Mohamed Shaker, said that the projects include a giant power plant that will be built by Germany’s Siemens in Cairo. He added that the government will build two other plants in Egypt’s northern province of Kafr El Sheikh and Beni Suef in the south.

The three stations, Shaker noted, will produce a total of 14,400 megawatts of electricity.

“The Siemens-built station is expected to be the largest air-cooled station in the world,” he added.

Egypt aims to cover 20 per cent of its electricity needs from renewable energy by 2022.