Egypt’s Cabinet approves $200 mln EBRD energy efficiency loan

Egypt’s government approved on Wednesday a $200 million loan deal signed with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD).

Signed last May, the loan is to be on-lent to state-run Suez Oil Processing Company (SOPC). It aims to support a project consisting of energy efficiency investments in SOPC fully consistent with the Green Economy Transition (GET) Approach and other refurbishments and installations to improve its operational performance, environmental footprint and utilisation rate.

With its Green Economy Transition (GET) approach, launched in 2015, the EBRD is strongly committed to supporting its countries of operations, and Egypt in particular, in adopting an environmentally-friendly model of development.

Building on a decade of successful green investments, the bank seeks to increase the volume of green financing to 40 percent of its annual business investment by 2020.The EBRD loan will be extended to the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) and its subsidiary Egyptian Natural Gas Company (GASCO) to fund the introduction of state-of-the-art technologies to recover waste heat from gas turbines used to drive gas compressors. The recovered heat will be used to produce additional energy, which will drive new electric compressors and replace fuels on-site. The introduction of new technology will lead to a reduction of over 250,000 tonnes of carbon-dioxide equivalent (CO2e) per year.