Kigali, 28 March 2019: Minister of Infrastructure, Hon. Claver Gatete together with Ambassador and Head of European Union Delegation to Rwanda, Ambassador Nicola Bellomo and other stakeholders officiated the inauguration of Nzove and Gahanga substations.

Nzove substation is built in Nyarugenge district and Gahanga substation in Kicukiro district with the capacity of 20MVA each.

Speaking at the function, Minister of Infrastructure, Hon. Claver Gatete said that such substations will help to supply electricity and reduce losses of electricity along transmission lines in different parts of Kigali, Bugesera, Muhanga and Kamonyi districts.

“The inaugurated Nzove and Gahanga substations will improve the quality of power supply in City of Kigali, Bugesera District and strategic facilities including Bugesera International Airport and Gahanga Stadium” Minister Gatete said.

He also stressed that the Government of Rwanda targets to connect all Rwandans by 2024; “The Government’s efforts are to ensure sufficient and reliable energy to all citizens. Rwanda currently has 27 substations and the target is to have 45 by 2024”, he mentioned.

The Head of European Union (EU) Delegation to Rwanda, Ambassador Nicola Bellomo hailed Rwanda’s milestone in the distribution of electricity especially reducing power losses which is the core target of the grid loss reduction project supported by EU.

"The objective of this investment is clear; improving the quality of supply of electricity for Kigali. Kigali needs more, better & cheaper power through a more efficient supply system, this is what this project is doing", Ambassador Bellomo said, adding that "The completed Gahanga & Nzove substations are additional concrete realizations of the Grid Loss Reduction project".

The Chief Executive Officer of REG, Eng. Ron Weiss said that this project has tremendously improved reliability and quality of power supply in the Kigali City.

 “There is a big improvement in terms of power loss reduction. During the 2016-2017 financial year, we had a power loss of 21.1% and we have been able to reduce it to 19.1% in the last financial year (2017-2018). This year, our goal is to reduce this leakage by 1%, thanks to such projects strengthening our distribution network.” he said.

Both stations were built under the project funded by European Union as part of a financing agreement worth € 23 million signed in March 2015 with the European Union to be used as part of a project and improve the quality of power supply to the Kigali city as well as reducing the losses level from 23% in 2013 with an annual goal of 1% reduction target. 

The project intended to build a 27 km long transmission line (110kV) linking Jabana, Mount Kigali and Gahanga, upgrade Mount Kigali, Jabana and Birembo substations as well as construction of two new substations, Nzove and Gahanga, inaugurated today. The project is also implementing installation of 8,000 smart meters to quantify losses and reactive power compensators as well as improve on the quality of voltage and reduce technical losses.