ESB International’s commercial manager has this week presented a paper at the largest power and energy event in Africa.

Dr Emma Silke presented the paper entitled ‘Tanzania – Implementing Long Term Solutions to Help Improve Power Distribution’ at Power and Electricity World Africa.

The paper outlined ESBI’s role in providing a $206m energy project in Tanzania on behalf of the US-funded Millennium Challenge Account – Tanzania.

The MCA-T Energy Project will significantly enhance the electricity infrastructure in Tanzania, where currently only 15% of the population has access to the electricity network. ESBI is consultant engineer and construction supervisor on the project.

Speaking at the conference, Dr. Silke said: "This project will directly impact on the lives of people across Tanzania, who up to now have been dependent on costly standby diesel generators or go without electricity. Our job is to make sure that every penny counts.

"We need to make sure that the new infrastructure is safe, robust and can stand the test of time, that it is delivered on time and within budget and that the local utilities Tanesco and Zeco have the skills and knowledge they need to manage and maintain the assets into the future."

ESBI is currently supervising the construction of the new infrastructure, which includes a new subsea interconnector from mainland Tanzania to Zanzibar Island, rural distribution extensions, substations and overhead lines.