The load-reducing schedule after Ramadan and the dates of power outages after the end of the holy month of Ramadan topped the Google search engine in Egypt, as the Council of Ministers had issued a decision regarding stopping the implementation of the load-reducing schedule during the month of fasting, provided that work begins again with the load-reducing plan after the end of the month. The holy month of Ramadan.
In this regard, Engineer Osama Kamal, the former Egyptian Minister of Petroleum, said that there are several reasons that lead to the return of power outages again after they stopped during the last month of Ramadan and the holiday period, most notably the country’s dependence on a mixture of fossil fuels or thermal plants, which is high. Cost, and requires the availability of gas and oil locally, like the Gulf countries, or the availability of funds to import them from abroad, like other countries.
Former Minister of Petroleum, Osama Kamal
Kamal added in an exclusive interview with Al-Arabiya.net and Al-Hadath.net that the geopolitical tensions that the region is going through directly affect the resources of the Egyptian state, after impacts occurred on the most important sources of foreign income in the tourism sector and the Suez Canal, through which the rate of ship crossings decreased. The import bill has risen very significantly, which in turn puts pressure on the state’s general budget, and the need to attract more foreign investments.
The former minister revealed that Egypt depends on the energy mix of oil and gas at a rate of 93%, which is a very large and unsafe number that causes these interruptions, in light of the lack of major breakthroughs in the renewable energy sector, whether solar energy stations, wind energy, or green hydrogen, which do not contribute more. From 5% of the country’s energy mix.
He pointed out that there is a government plan to reach the contribution of renewable energy to 42% of the energy mix in the country, but it is difficult to reach this percentage in light of the current situation, as it requires 25 gigabytes of renewable energy in the next six years, while from 2014 until Now only 2% is done.
Regarding the energy generated from the High Dam, Kamal said that it is constant and has not been affected, but energy is generated from it only during the period when the turbines are open and not throughout the year, indicating that the hope may be to start producing electricity from nuclear energy from the Dabaa station in the north of the country, where it is expected The station will contribute to generating 5 gigawatts of electricity, which is the number that Egypt currently needs to meet needs during the summer period to cover the deficit, but the reactor needs two and a half years to start producing energy, perhaps at the beginning of 2027.
Dabaa Nuclear Station – Archive
Last month, the Nuclear Power Plants Authority in Egypt announced the start of the installation of the internal containment vessel for the reactor building in the first nuclear unit of the Dabaa nuclear station. In January 2024, concrete pouring for the fourth reactor at the Dabaa nuclear station in Egypt began with the participation of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and Russian President Vladimir Putin via video call.
The government called for changing the way investments in renewable energy are dealt with by giving space to developers to work freely, providing land for them only, and dealing with them like dealing with the petroleum sector, by giving the land to the investor, who in turn carries out energy generation projects, and the government gets its share of the project for free, and the investor’s part is He is free to export or sell it directly to factories and other parties, thus saving the government the costs of spending on providing the energy mix for thermal plants, which costs the general budget huge amounts.
It is noteworthy that, as of today, Monday, the load reduction plan approved by the Council of Ministers in July 2023 will return to work, with the duration of the power cut being one to two hours per day. The Council of Ministers had also decided to set the daily power cut times to be from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., while adhering to the power cut period, which ranges between one and two hours.
