{"id":21781,"date":"2025-12-29T14:38:51","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T12:38:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/zimbabwe-thermal-plant-upgrade-to-add-400-megawatts-to-grid\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:32:44","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:32:44","slug":"zimbabwe-thermal-plant-upgrade-to-add-400-megawatts-to-grid","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/zimbabwe-thermal-plant-upgrade-to-add-400-megawatts-to-grid\/","title":{"rendered":"Zimbabwe thermal plant upgrade to add 400 megawatts to grid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">The southern African country has signed a 15-year concession deal with the Africa-focused unit of India&#8217;s Jindal Steel for the refurbishment of some of the thermal power plant&#8217;s ageing units.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">The deal, which was approved by Zimbabwe&#8217;s cabinet on September 17, was finalised and signed in December, ZESA&#8217;s Acting Chief Executive Officer Cletus Nyachowe said in an update seen by <\/span><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Reuters<\/span><\/em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> on Monday.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">&#8220;The 15-year agreement with Jindal will lead to enhanced power generation, which will add 400 MW to our output within the next 48 months,&#8221; Nyachowe said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">&#8220;Rehabilitation work is set to commence in the first quarter of 2026,\u201d he added.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Zimbabwe currently meets only half of its <\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">2 000<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> MW electricity demand and experiences extended power cuts due to diminishing capacity at its power plants.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">The <\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">1 520<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> MW Hwange plant, the country&#8217;s largest, was upgraded in 2023 with the commissioning of two units adding 600 MW.<\/span> <span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">But<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> older units built in the 1980s are operating at a third of their capacity due to breakdowns.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":21782,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[44],"class_list":["post-21781","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-finance","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Zimbabwe will add 400 megawatts to its power grid, a fifth of the country's current electricity demand, under a $455 million upgrade of its Hwange coal-fired power plant, the Head of State-owned power utility, Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA), said.","published_date":null,"news_description":"Zimbabwe will add 400 megawatts to its power grid, a fifth of the country's current electricity demand, under a $455 million upgrade of its Hwange coal-fired power plant, the Head of State-owned power utility, Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA), said.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/21781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/21781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25317,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/21781\/revisions\/25317"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=21781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}