Zambia could be enjoying surplus electricity soon, courtesy of a robust hydraulic and solar power industry. It means that for Zambia power cuts could be a thing of the past.
Electricity production in the country has significantly increased especially because of the plants near the Itezhi-Tezhi dam. Zambia utilizes its natural resources for electricity production - biomass, coal and hydroelectricity. The Itezhi-Tezhi hydroelectric generating station was built at a cost of $375 million, and started being operational in 2016.
Zambia's planning when it comes to energy should probably serve as an example to other countries. Since the Itezhi-Tezhi station became operational, the country's power generation capacity has increased by 7.5%. This means that an extra 50,000 people were provided with electricity.
Production of electricity in Zambia has been so commendable such that the country stopped importing electricity from neighbouring countries such as Mozambique in the first quarter of 2018.
Webster Musonda, who is the head of power transmission at ZESCO, said, "Zambia's power generation capacity has improved and will now be able to largely meet its energy needs." "Overall, we will be able to meet demand and routine energy imports will cease [...] but we will continue to import energy to meet occasional peaks in demand."
Solar power has also been top of the agenda for Zambia, in order to create energy surpls in the coming two years. Zambia is constructing mini solar power plants which are expected to have a capacity of 600MW, and this will come at a cost of $1.2 billion.
On the other hand, Zambia's neighbour Zimbabwe is suffering from severe daily blackouts.
One Twitter user wrote, "#Zimbabwe is suffering from loadshedding while Zambia which we share Kariba Hydro Electricity with sound.
Whilst Zambia was building solar power projects, Zanu-PF was busy protecting @SirWicknell who stole 5 million USDollars mearnt for solar power projects and bought shoes."
Header image credit - AfDB