Bujagali
Location: Jinja
Operator: Bujagali Energy Ltd
Configuration: 5 X 51 MW Kaplan
Operation: 2012
T/G supplier: Alstom
EPC: Lahmeyer, Norplan, Salini
Quick facts: This project was initiated in the late 1990s by AES Nile Power Ltd. When AES withdrew, the Uganda government and the World Bank selected Bujagali Energy Ltd to take on the project after an international competitive bidding process. BEL is jointly owned by affiliates of Sithe Global Power and the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development. The site is on the Victoria Nile River near the Jinja Town. Uganda Electricity Transmission Co Ltd is responsible for a new 97km transmission tie-line and a substation at Kawanda. Much of the proposed route is on the right-of-way for the existing power transmission line connecting the Nalubaale power station and Kampala North Substation.

Kiira
Location: Jinja
Operator: Uganda Electricity Generating Co Ltd
Configuration: 5 X 41 MW Kaplan
Operation: 2000-2004
T/G supplier: Kvaerner
EPC: Acres, Impregilo, Salini
Quick facts: Kiira  is on the Victoria Nile at Jinja and is slightly downstream of the Narubale plant. The Kiira extension project utilizes the head pond behind the existing concrete gravity dam to supply a new powerhouse on the opposite bank of the Nile via a 1.3km power canal. The plant is connected to the grid at 132kV.

Photograph courtesy of Hatch Ltd
Posted 10 Jun 2007

Mpanga
Location: Kabarole
Operator: South Asia Energy Management Systems Inc
Configuration: 3 X 6.2 MW Kaplan
Operation: 2011
T/G supplier: REproS, VS Hydro, Ideal
EPC: VS Hydro
Quick facts: Mpanga plant in Kabeeza Kamwenge District was commissioned in Feb 2011 and will benefit Over 20,000 households in the western part of Uganda. the project cost Shs57bn. In 2008, government partnered with local company African EMS Mpanga to start the project. The Rural Electrification Agency (REA) constructed the associated transmission works and Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund provided US$14md of senior debt for the project.

Nalubaale
Location: Jinja
Operator: Uganda Electricity Generating Co Ltd
Configuration: 10 X 18 MW Kaplan
Operation: 1954-1969
T/G supplier: Boving, GEC
EPC: Kennedy & Donkin, Christiani and Nielsen Ltd, Dorman Long and Co, Edmund Nuttall Sons & Co, Hollandsche Beton, Internationale Gewapendbeton, K L Kier and Co Ltd, Nederlandsche Aanneming, Bato
Quick facts: The history of central station electric power in Uganda began after World War II when Egypt and the British government (on behalf of Kenya, Tanganyika, and Uganda) renewed planning for integrated development of the Nile River for water and power supply. In 1947, Sir Charles Redvers Westlake recommended to the Colonial Government of Uganda that a hydroelectric dam be built at Owen Falls near Jinja, and this in turn led to the establishment of the Uganda Electricity Board (UEB) in 1948 with Westlake as its first chairman. The dam and first six sets were completed in 1954 at a cost of about £21mn. The Owen Falls dam and power station was opened by Queen Elizabeth on 1 May 1954. The photo shows Vice President Richard Nixon visiting the dam in 1957. The complex was later renamed.

Photograph by Mark Kauffman (Life archive on Google)
Posted 7 Mar 2009