Infrastructure Development Project. The Infrastructure Development Project will rehabilitate, upgrade and modernize ESCOM’s generation, transmission and distribution assets in most urgent need of repair, in order to preserve existing generation, improve the capacity of the transmission system, and increase the efficiency and sustainability of hydropower generation. To facilitate the development and implementation of the Program, MCC is providing support for the Government’s ability to identify and prioritize investments in the sector by developing an integrated resource plan. MCC Funding will support significant investments in the power system infrastructure to preserve generation and stabilize and modernize the transmission and distribution network. The Infrastructure Development Project is only viable, technically and economically, if the Government and ESCOM maintain current generation assets and expand the generation capacity of the power system. Under the Infrastructure Development Project, the Government will invest in new generation by completing the construction of the Kapichira II hydropower plant. Additionally, the Government will continue to seek to attract sustainable investment from the private sector and other donors to add significant amounts of new generation to the system. The Parties expect that by the end of the Compact Term, the Infrastructure Development Project, together with the Government’s commitment to complete construction of Kapichira II, will result in increases in generation capacity (from 286 MW to approximately 352 MW), network throughput capacity (from 310 MW to approximately 960 MW) and distribution capacity (from 868 MVA to approximately 1,078 MVA), and a reduction of total system losses from 20-25 percent to 18 percent.
Infrastructure Development Project. The evaluation will attempt to assess the effectiveness of individual transmission lines and distribution investments in reducing outages and improving power quality using a combination of approaches, to include potentially an interrupted time series approach, exogenous spatial variation due to the project, combined if sufficiently informative with phased implementation of distribution projects. The incremental impacts of improved reliability, quality and access to power will be explored by comparing key intermediate outcomes, including changes in business investments and productivity, between businesses with access to infrastructure improvements, those without access to improvements, and for those in areas or zones that experience greater or lesser improvements in electricity due to differential levels of infrastructure upgrading. Gender disaggregated information will be pursued to the extent possible.
