600MW Karuma Hydro Dam will be commissioned next year – Nankabirwa
The dam has experienced a number of setbacks over the years, both technical and financial - greatly delaying its commissioning date by several years.
By Bakar Ssettumba
The Minister of Energy and Mineral Development, Ruth Nankabirwa, has confirmed that the 600MW Karuma hydropower dam will be commissioned next year.
The minister gave this assurance in an interview with Charmar News at the Ministry’s headquarters in Kampala, following a spate of load-shedding episodes that engulfed the country in November.
The Uganda Electricity Transmission Company Ltd (UETCL) has blamed the outages on vandalism of electricity infrastructure by criminals intending to sell the pylons as scrap metal.
Nankabirwa says that Karuma Dam could have been commissioned earlier but due to some technical challenges it could not.
“We will commission one unit first which is 100MW. The dry testing began in April and was completed in September,” she said.
“All equipment was tested and the plant was synchronised to the national grid for stability. The equipment was found able to withstand,” she added.
The dam has experienced a number of setbacks over the years, both technical and financial – greatly delaying its commissioning date by several years.
“We are not going to rush the plant for political commissioning. We have to take the technical commissioning unit by unit,” Nankabirwa insisted.
“We can’t commission 600MW at a go. You have to test first the stability of the grid to avoid ending up blowing up everything,” she added.
The minister also blamed the dam’s delayed commissioning on the Pandemic.
“Covid-19 affected all the projects in Uganda because the station staff were demobilized,” she noted.
“We want to see a very vibrant electricity supply industry since electricity is the driver of our economy” she added.
Despite the assurances of increased electricity supply, there are concerns that this power remains very expensive to the consumer which has affected it’s demand in a country where poverty rates are rising especially due to the pandemic.
The 600MW Karuma hydropower plant is located on the River Nile in Kiryandongo district in mid-Northern Uganda, 270km from the Capital, Kampala.
