Mauritania to provide electricity to power-starved Senegal

September 12, 2013 7:57 AM

Mauritania is to begin providing energy-starved Senegal with electricity within two years, both sides announced Thursday after a summit between their presidents in Dakar.
Mauritania will sell its west African neighbour 80 megawatts at cost price from March 2015, with the possibility of increasing to 120 MW, a joint statement from the two countries said.
The cost and completion dates for power lines between the two countries have not been set out yet, said the statement, released after Mauritanian head of state Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz spent Tuesday and Wednesday in Senegal, meeting President Macky Sall.
The gas to be used to generate the electricity will be extracted from Mauritania by a British-led consortium, according to several sources in Nouakchott.
The World Bank estimates that the Senegalese endure 12 days when there are power outages during the average month, though the cost of electricity supply is among the highest in the world.
Like many African power companies, state-owned Senelec is unable to match supply with demand.
Senegal and Mauritania already have a number of agreements in place, most notably in the fields of hydrology, security and fishing.