The Renewable Energy Solution and the Matadi Mess

Over the last few weeks we have been thinking a lot about potential energy solutions for the living situation in Mbanaka. A curious fact about Mbandaka (and much of the rest of the DRC) is that the city had running water and a functioning grid with electricity supply in 1960, when independence was declared. What followed was a steady but dramatic decline, so that the GDP per capita is lower today (after decades of exporting minerals) than it was in 1960.

When it come to the energy supply the country of DRC has vast hydro-power potential with Inga – a grand dam which could provide energy for the entire African continent, yet the majority of Congolese households and even the people in the capital of Kinshasa have no access to electricity (6% of households in the country, while 40% have access to some kind of electricity in Kinshasa). 

The potential of Inga is estimated to be around 100,000 MW (the largest in Africa), with a current production capacity of 2,459 (but actual production is not even half this figure, because a large part of the production capacity is not in working order).

Clearly adequate access to reliable energy could fuel major economic and social development, but with many years of negligence and inadequate maintenance, energy supply is a disaster in this country. In the case of Inga, it has numerous power cuts (some 180 a year based on the World Bank) and facilities are maintained and repaired on an ad hoc basis in response to emergencies only. A great deal of power is lost in transport and distribution (around 40% in 2008),… which is mostly exported to South Africa anyway!!! In fact our friend from the World Bank who visited Inga mentioned that even the cities and villages right around the dam have absolutely NO electricity while the power lines are build over their head to export energy to the south of the continent…. The World bank and the AfDB (African Development Bank) are financing the rehabilitation of Inga… to “raise the quality of the electricity supply in the DRC and increase EXPORT CAPACITY to SAPP (Southern African Power Pool) countries."

For the people in Mbandaka this promised raise in quality of electricity supply is just a faint dream. They have a power station but it has collapsed many years ago, as one of the previous governors decided to stop maintenance on it. 

Right next to the mighty Congo river Micro Hydro would be a nice idea for the city. Biomass is another option, but would most likely promote deforestation and substituting food with fuel crops with devastating results for the already undernourished population. 

So Solar it is! After the visit of Heinz my hopes are high that solar will work just fine in Mbandaka. We do have cloud cover at times, but it is still bright and in fact (as Heinz explained) the white clouds actually reflect the light back and increase the production. As mentioned previously products here are expensive and poor in quality. So finding a decent solar supplier is difficult. WWF decided to import products themselves from Germany and the US (including Heinz), but it did take them 2 years to finalize the project and not all the pieces arrived…. WHY is that? And why the hell are the other products so damn expensive here…. Well, a major reason is the route products use to enter the country… through the port of Matadi on the West coast of the DRC. (there are two other entry points into the country, Kasumbalesa and Goma, which suffer many of the same issues as Matadi).

Matadi – the very high fee=very low service quality- kind of port!

As the WB summarized: “Transit at the port of Matadi is slow, complex and costly. It involves multiple and superfluous checks. (…) Control procedures are outdated (essentially manual) and marked by a logic of excessive controls and mutual mistrust among those involved”

There are many more issues with Matadi, including that it is an inland port and much to shallow for large boots to enter – also because maintenance is not kept up, equipment is not present and even though there is a plethora of “work force” technical skills are lacking.

The transportation cost from Matadi to Kin (or anywhere else in the country) are extremely high. For one because there are very, very few functioning transport routes left in the country. Roads have be reclaimed by the forest, and the Congo river that could provide very cheap shipping is not utilized (14 ships that were donated two years for the Kin – Mbandaka – Kisangani transport, have all disappeared for example, but also no dredging is done, making the Congo hard to navigate during the four months of dry season). But there is more: right not there is a law in place that foreigners have to insure their cargo with a Congolese insurance – in this case the monopoly operation is called SONAS (and I have not found out yet how they are related to the government, but I am sure they are) The World Bank writes about the SONAS monopoly “its insurance policies and its indemnity payment capacity are considered totally inadequate by carriers. To overcome this problem, they need to take insurance outside the DRC to back the policy issued by SONAS, thus incurring substantial additional costs”.

The Matadi- Kinshasa railroad is in a terrible state and needs/could be rehabilitated, and rates as a ‘high potential project, yet there is a much easier way, as the WB writes:” however, important issues concerning priorities for access to the sea from Kinshasa, is the construction of a continuous rail corridor between Pointe Noire (the port in Kongo Brazzaville) and Kinshasa (over a bridge across the Congo River)”

Point Noire is a deep water port right on the coast  and in great shape. It only has to be dredged once every five years, while Matadi has to be dredged EVERY DAY. And while Matadi must have navigatgion aids and piloting for 150 km, it is only 2 km for Pointe Noire. Already all the big international boats land in Point Noirs, and have to transfer and split there load onto small boats to reach Matadi. 

Point Noire is in Kongo Brazzaville, with a railroad to the capital Brazzaville, which is right across from Kin, you could easily transport imports for MUCH CHEAPER. Yet no boats are in sight, not bridge is being build to connect the two capitals, and no plans are being made to start getting imports from Point Noir on the railroad and a bridge to Kinshasa or right up the Congo river to Mbandaka. And why? Because the government in Kin doesn't like the government across the river inBrazzaville, so they rather have a tinny amount of people benefit immensely while the rest of the country pays the price! (the reluctance of the government in Kin to work with any other neighboring nation will be discussed again soon : ) 

With multiple customs officers all wanting money, and the average time in the port being 33 days (with a minimum of 3 days, a maximum of 84 days, in comparision the average duration is between 15 and 20 days in Mombasa, and 3 days in Madagascar with very few containers remaining beyond a week) Matadi is expense, inefficient and simply put: a HUGE  mess!

So with this in mind, how shall we expect decent prices or quality goods coming into the country… and how will we get our solar system here? The chances are not very good and we might just have to hope again, that the universe will work in mysterious ways and we get a high quality solar system very soon! : )