EIB and African Development Bank finance first large-scale wind farm in Africa

The European Investment Bank and African Development Bank today agreed to provide EUR 45m to design, build and operate onshore wind farms on four islands in the Cape Verde archipelago. This will be the first large scale wind project in Africa and first renewable energy public private partnership in sub-Saharan Africa. The project will provide over 28MW of electricity generating capacity and help the island reach an ambitious target of ensuring that 25% of local power needs are provided by renewable energy by 2012 and 50% by 2020. The project is being developed by InfraCo in a public-private partnership between the government of Cape Verde and local power utility Electra.