Saturday, September 13, 2014

Tanzanian Appointed Head of Rusumo Power Project

 Habari Njema!  Mzalendo amepata nafiai hii na siyo Expatriate! Chapa kazi Mzee!



A TANZANIAN national, Engineer Joackim Joseph, has been appointed the first Managing Director of the 80MW Rusumo Power Project that is set to benefit Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi.

The Minister for Energy and Minerals, Prof Sospeter Muhongo, made the revelation, saying he was proud that a Tanzanian has been appointed to manage the project, which will be headquartered in Kigali, Rwanda.

"We should also not forget that another Tanzanian, Lebbi Changula, was recently appointed Executive Secretary of the Eastern Africa Power Pool based in Addis Ababa in Ethiopia," Prof Muhongo boasted.

Eng. Joseph has a Bachelor of Science and Masters of Science in Engineering. Before his appointment, he was the coordinator of Millennium Challenge Account-Tanzania energy projects implemented by the Tanzania Electric Supply Company (Tanesco).

At Tanesco, he also worked as programme manager for grid rehabilitation and upgrading. The Rusumo Power Station is a proposed hydropower plant, with initial planned capacity installation of 80MW when completed.

The project will involve construction of a dam and a 90MW reservoir design had been envisaged, but was abandoned in favour of an 80MW design with a smaller environmental impact and an estimated cost of US$300 million as opposed to US$400 million for the bigger project.

The World Bank announced in August, 2013 that it had approved the funding needed for the project Power generated from Rusumo will be shared equally among Burundi, Rwanda and Tanzania and it will be distributed from the generation plant via 220 kV transmission lines to transmission stations in Gitega in Burundi, Kigali in Rwanda and to Nyakanazi in Tanzania.

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