TANZANIA: CEMENT FIRM, POWER UTILITY SIGN CONTRACT

Tanzania Electric Supply Company Deputy Managing Director, (Investment) Decklan Mhaiki (second left), Tanga Cement Co Ltd Managing Director, Reinhardt Swart (second right) exchanging contact documents for power supply agreement in Dar es Salaam yesterday. The agreement assures TCCL to receive eduquate and reliable supply of electricity on the 132/33kv grid. Looking on left is TANESCO Legal Manager, Contracts and Commercial Affairs, Mwesiga Mwesigwa and right is TCCL Plant Manager, Eng. Ben Lema. 

TANGA Cement Company Limited (TCCL) and Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited (TANESCO) have signed a power supply agreement that assures the cement firm to receive MVA 40 through its substation in Pongwe in Tanga.

Tanesco Deputy Managing Director (Investments) Decklan Mhaiki told a news conference in Dar es Salaam that the agreement would improve Tanga Cement's production capacity.

"Tanga Cement is one of our long and high level customers and taking that into consideration, we have agreed to supply power to their second substation in Pongwe to improve their production capacity," he said.

He said that the agreement will enable Tanesco to generate nearly MVA 40 instead of MVA 20 that is generating currently through their substation in Tanga Region.

Mr Mhaiki underscored that the process of power supply agreement was firstly approved and verified by Energy and Water Utilities Regulators Authority (EWURA) to ensure standards of joint ventures.

TCCL Managing Director, Mr Reinhardt Swart, said that the move aims to revamp the production capacity while expanding the firm's business across the country.

"We are aware that all cement plants uses a lot of power from Tanesco so we have decided to construct our own substation to get direct power from Tanesco to reduce unnecessary interruption during the production and operations process," he said.

He further said that the agreement comes at a time when the cement manufacturer is expanding the capacity of its operations, whereby a new second kiln is being constructed at its plant in Tanga.

Mr Swart said that the agreement also provides guidelines on communicating power outages between two parties so as to minimise production disruptions at the cement plant.