ADB lends $36.8M for Pakistan wind farm

ADB will provide Turkish utility Zorlu Enerji Electrik Uretim with a $36.8 million loan to increase the capacity of a wind farm in Pakistan.

The wind farm is in the southern Sindh province, 100km northeast of Karachi and is the first privately owned and financed wind farm in Pakistan.

Zorlu Enerji will use the loan to install new turbines and increase the capacity from 6MW to 56.4MW. Construction is expected to be completed in 2012.

Once complete, the project will supply power through a 20-year pay power purchase agreement with the National Transmission and Dispatch Company.

The total cost of the project is $147 million with 30% financed by Zorlu Enerji and the rest through loans from ADB, the International Finance Corp., the ECO Trade and Development Bank and Habib Bank.

The Pakistan government aims to have 6% renewable energy by 2030. It is estimated that there is 50GW of potential wind power capacity in the south of the country. Pakistan's government is aiming for 4.6GW in the Sindh region alone.

In March, Pakistan company FFC Energy signed a deal with Nordex to supply turbines for the Jhimpir 50MW wind station in Sindh.