By Patience Loum and Edrissa Jallow
The Director of Environment and Sustainable Development for Gambia River Basin Development Organization (OMVG), Demba Jallow has revealed that the construction of the Sambangalo Dam in Senegal is in progress and will hopefully be launched before the end of 2022.
Mr Jallow made this revelation on 10th October 2022, during the formal opening of the West African Power Pool (WAPP) forum that focuses on power purchases in the OMVG regions at the Sir Dawda Kiaraba Jawara International Conference Center in Bijilo.
The OMVG energy project developed the Sambangalou dam site to improve electricity access and provide affordable renewable energy within the OMVG’s member states. The members’ states include The Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Senegal.
According to a publication by the International Journal on Hydropower and Dams dated 17th February 2021, the project is worth over €388 million which is equivalent to twenty-three billion two hundred and eighty million dalasis (D23,280,000,000) at a standard rate of D60 per Euro.
The report further highlights that the Sambangalou project “which is to be located 930 km upstream from the mouth of the river Gambia, will feature a 91 m-high gravity dam, which will impound a 3.8 km3 reservoir spanning the territories of Senegal and Guinea”.
According to the OMVG Director of Environment, Mr Jallow the dam project is currently in progress with an installed capacity of 128 MWp. He went further to say that “works on this Dam is expected to be launched before the end of 2022”.
“We [OMVG] are pleased to inform you that in addition to the energy and second-generation Projects, OMVG is in an advanced stage of preparing a multisectoral integrated Masterplan” which he said, “will go a long way in complementing the ongoing initiatives”.
Mr Jallow further urged electricity companies in member states to fasten their belt in connecting neighbourhoods close to the OMVG substations through the support of the World Bank and African Development Bank to increase access to electricity in the subregion.
