Standard Bank to help finance 60.8-MW Kenyan wind farm

Oct 4, 2013 - South Africa's Standard Bank Group said Thursday it would help finance Aeolus Kenya’s 60.8-MW Kinangop wind project in Kenya which requires an investment of some USD 150 million (EUR 110m).

Syndication of the debt is already in progress, while the project’s financial close is expected in the coming three weeks. Standard Bank will be the lead arranger and will underwrite USD 90 million of the debt. At the same time, USD 60 million of equity will come from the Norwegian Investment Fund for Developing Countries (Norfund) and an unnamed major global infrastructure investor that is focused on Africa, the bank said.

“Standard Bank has signed mandates to develop other wind farms in Kenya some of which are going to be larger in size,” said Kwame Parker, Standard Bank Group’s East Africa Head of Debt Solutions and Infrastructure Finance. He added that the lender was already examining opportunities to support hydropower and geothermal projects in eastern Africa, without disclosing any specifics.

The Kinangop wind farm project, located in central Kenya’s Kinangop Plateau, is expected to come on stream in the middle of 2015. It will produce enough power to cover the needs of some 150,000 local homes, Standard Bank says. Most of the output will be sold to the Kenyan government. There is a power purchase agreement in place with utility Kenya Power.

Independent power producer Aeolus Kenya is a member of the US government’s Power Africa initiative that aims to develop 1 GW of wind, geothermal and gas-fired projects in East Africa. The 60.8-MW project is the company’s first of several in a strategic project pipeline.

(USD 1 = EUR 0.735)

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