COUNTRY BROCHURES

Botswana is a landlocked country in Southern Africa sharing borders with South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Namibia. It has a total area of 582,000km2 and a population of approximately 1.85 million, most of which settled in the eastern part of the country. The Kalahari Desert covers most of the western part of the country.

Currently Botswana Power Corporation (BPC) generates, imports and supplies the electricity consumed in the country. The installed capacity is 132MW and maximum demand in 2006 was 434MW. Botswana receives more than 3,200 hours of sunshine per annum and there is a lot of potential to generate both thermal and photovoltaic electricity from solar energy. Botswana also has huge coal reserves currently estimated at over 200 billion tonnes.

The Kingdom of Lesotho is situated in the eastern part of southern Africa. It is a landlocked country and completely surrounded by the Republic of South Africa.

Lesotho’s energy resources are mainly renewable: hydropower, solar energy, wind and biomass fuels. Explorations have indicated that fossil energy resources (coal, oil and natural gas) are not available. There is an estimated hydropower potential of 3GW pumped storage and 450MW conventional generation. Of this 76MW is exploited and the peak demand in 2006 was 90MW. Wind potential is estimated at 20MW.

Mozambique occupies an area of over 800,000 km2 on the south-eastern coast of Africa. It borders Tanzania in the north, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the south.

The Mozambican government considers access to reliable and sustainable forms of energy important for poverty alleviation and promoting economic development. The energy sector’s vision is to develop the country’s energy potential for social upliftment and economic growth, exploiting regional marketing opportunities while continuing to preserve and protect the environment.

South Africa is located on the southern tip of the African continent. Namibia is its neighbour to the north-west and Botswana and Zimbabwe to the north. On the north eastern border lies Mozambique and Swaziland.

South Africa has by far the largest economy in the Southern African region, and as such represents the largest market for electricity. Eskom, its vertically integrated state-owned utility, produces more than half of all the electricity in Africa, while the some of the larger local authority utilities, such as City Power of Johannesburg, is bigger than most national utilities of other countries in the region.

Swaziland is located in the eastern part of southern Africa. It is a landlocked country and shares borders with South Africa and Mozambique. In 2007 Swaziland had an installed capacity of 70MW and a peak demand of 172MW.