UAE – Mubasher: Hamriyah Independent Power Company in Sharjah has received funding for GE’s flagship 1.8 gigawatts (GW) power project, expected to be the most efficient power plant in the Middle East’s utilities sector when completed. 

Co-developers GE Energy Financial Services and Japan’s Sumitomo Corporation along with Shikoku Electric Power Company and Sharjah Asset Management, the investment arm of the Government of Sharjah, have closed the funding from leading private financial institutions as well as the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), Japan’s export credit agency (ECA).

Securing a total private-public co-financing amount of nearly $1 billion financing for the project will lead to the first independent combined cycle power project in the emirate of Sharjah, according to a recent statement.

“The co-developers have formed an equity consortium for the Project with Shikoku Electric Power Company and SAM. The consortium’s role will be to build, own, and operate the project,” the statement concluded.

This project will consist of three combined cycle blocks, the first of which is planned to come online in 2021. The Project is expected to reach full commercial operations by the summer of 2023 and will sell its electricity production to SEWA under a 25-year Power Purchase Agreement (PPA).

General manager of Global Power Infrastructure Business Division at Sumitomo Corporation, Norihiko Nonaka said: “Sumitomo remains committed to supporting the continuing economic growth in the United Arab Emirates through the delivery of reliable, cost effective, clean and sustainable power from both our existing and new power infrastructure.”