Green investing in Egypt constitutes 40% of total public investments in 2022/2023: Cabinet

Ahram Online , Monday 21 Nov 2022

Egypt's green investments in the current fiscal year 2022/2023 constitute 40 percent of the country's total public investments with a value of EGP 410 billion, the cabinet said on Monday.

solar power
Engineers walk next to solar panels at Benban Solar Park, one of the world s largest solar power plant in the world, in Aswan, Egypt, Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2022. AP

Of this amount, EGP 259 billion has gone to clean transportation, EGP 38 billion to sustainable sanitation service and EGP 25 billion to clean energy, the cabinet's media centre said in a report.

In addition, the state allocated EGP 22 billion for clean drinking water, EGP 18.5 billion for improving the environment, EGP 14 billion for sustainable irrigation and EGP 11 billion for agriculture, according to the report.

In September, El-Sisi said Egypt seeks to increase the percentage of green investments to 50 percent of total public investments by FY2023/2024.

Clean energy

Over the past year, Egypt signed 16 memoranda of understanding (MoUs) on green ammonia and green hydrogen production in the Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZone) with international partners, nine of which were turned into contracts.

Egypt unveiled its low-carbon hydrogen strategy during the 27th UN Climate Change Conference (COP27) held in Sharm El-Sheikh and announced partnerships with international partners, including the EU, on green hydrogen.

The country plans to become an international hub for producing and exporting green hydrogen and to generate 42 percent of its electric power using renewable sources by 2035.

To this end, Egypt had previously established the $2 billion Benban solar park, which is one of the largest worldwide, with a production capacity of 1,465 MW, the report said.

The massive project was completed late in 2019, with the aim of powering hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses.

Egypt also plans to establish a pumped storage hydropower project with total investments of $2.7 billion and a capacity of 2,400 MW.

Egypt's clean energy projects also include the EGP 12 billion Gabal El-Zeit wind farm of the Red Sea governorate with an overall capacity of 580 MW. Also, a EGP 4.3 billion solar plant is being established in Suez governorate with a capacity of 250 MW, the report noted.

Clean transportation

The country has embarked on a number of clean transportation projects, including the 2.7 billion euro monorail lines in the New Administrative Capital, east of Cairo, and Giza's Sixth of October city.

The new capital line is set to accommodate around 600,000 passengers per day while the Giza line will accommodate 650,000 passengers per day, the report explained.

Egypt also embarked on its first high-speed electric railway project at a cost of EGP 519.5 billion, covering a distance of around 2,000 kilometres.

This comes in addition to the country's first light rail transit (LRT) which was inaugurated by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi in July to transfer a million passengers per day.

Vehicles converted to run on natural gas across Egypt have increased by 126.5 percent from October 2014 until last October to reach 472,000 vehicles, the report said.

Moreover, 2,300 buses in Cairo and Alexandria will be converted to natural gas over the coming eight years at a cost of EGP 1.4 billion.

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