by Ronny Zikhali

THE Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA) seeking local companies to assist it in the rehabilitation of the Bulawayo Thermal Power Station, an official has said.
Mr Fullard Gwasira, the ZESA spokesperson revealed that the parastatal signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoU) with a Botswana power company to rehabilitate the Bulawayo thermal power station in a deal that is worth $9 million dollars.
“Plans have always been there to rehabilitate this power station. We’ve actually gone into an agreement with a Botswana power company to rehabilitate the Bulawayo power station. We’ve signed a memorandum of agreement similar to the one of Hwange power station and it is worth 9 million dollars,” he said.
However, Mr Gwasira noted that the running of thermal power stations is more expensive than hydro power stations hence; it is still open for local companies to venture into an agreement with the parastatal to rehabilitate the power station in exchange for exemption in power cuts.
“It is not a secret that operating a thermal power station is more expensive than running
a thermal power station due to the fact that you have to acquire and transport coal and so forth. It is however still open for local companies to get into an agreement with us where they can deliver the coal and other services in return for exemption in the power cuts or load shedding,” he said.
He said that earlier this year Zesa went out to seek local companies that would be interested in such an arrangement, but they got limited response and they are actually evaluating the responses.
Zesa is set to commence the rehabilitation of the power station after they have finished the evaluation exercise but it also is putting plans in place to start the rehabilitation earlier than anticipated.
“We actually put advertisements in the media early this year to look for companies that would be interested in getting into such an agreement with us but we got limited responses from local companies. We are currently evaluating these responses after which we can start the rehabilitation exercise. However we are putting plans in place to start the rehabilitation sooner,” he said.
Mr Gwasira said the Bulawayo power station is expected to have an output of 90 megawatts when operating in full capacity.
Mr Gwasira also noted that this rehabilitation exercise is an on going exercise that is set to see the rehabilitation of all power stations in the country, but it is going to take time as the country is still recovering from the economic meltdown that rocked the country in the past few years.
Currently only the Kariba hydro power station and the Hwange thermal power station have benefited from this rehabilitation exercise.