Cazombo, Moxico Leste, Angola, Dec. 4, 2025 (Lusa) – The Angolan government has inaugurated the largest off-grid photovoltaic park in sub-Saharan Africa, an infrastructure that will bring continuous electricity to an isolated community of more than 130,000 inhabitants for the first time.
Located in the capital of the new province of Moxico Leste, a remote region more than 1,500 kilometres from Luanda, the project, inaugurated on Wednesday and built by the Portuguese company MCA includes innovative technologies, including a battery storage system and Blackstart technology, which allows automatic start-up in the event of failures.
"If in the future the system is connected to a grid, it will prevent blackouts such as the one that occurred in Portugal in April this year," explained Elisabete Alves, Chief Operating Officer of the MCA group, during a visit to the site on Wednesday, emphasising that this is also "the first fully renewable power plant" in the country.
Cazombo is one of 60 locations included in the Angolan government's electrification plan to supply electricity to more than 200,000 homes, benefiting around one million people.
The total investment exceeds US$1 billion (equivalent to around €862 million), according to the Minister of Energy and Water, João Baptista Borges.
In addition to the immediate impact of providing 24-hour access to electricity to around 136,000 people, the solar project translates into an estimated annual saving of almost 10 million litres of fuel, a scarce, expensive resource that is difficult to transport to this remote area, the minister pointed out.
"It is a historic milestone for the province of Moxico Leste and for Angola," he said, stressing that it is "much more than solar panels: it means progress, inclusion and energy independence".
By road, Google Maps estimates that it takes at least 21 hours to reach Cazombo, but the journey can take more than one day due to the lack of paved roads.
The environmental impact is equally significant, with an estimated reduction of 37,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year.
In the capital of this new province, which is about to celebrate its first anniversary, 12 of the 16,000 planned household connections have already been installed, of which 3,000 are already active. These will be served by a 25-megawatt (MW) power plant with 75 MW of storage capacity, consisting of 40,320 South Korean solar panels.
The solar package also includes works in the provinces of Bié, Malanje, Lunda Norte, Lunda Sul, Moxico and Moxico Leste, involving an electrification programme with a total installed capacity of 256 megawatts-peak (MWp) and 595 megawatt-hours (MWh) of battery storage.
Visibly satisfied, as are some of the residents of Cazombo who already have electricity in their homes, the governor of Moxico Leste, Crispiniano dos Santos, believes that these projects will boost the province's agricultural and industrial development.
At the same time, he hopes that they will mobilise private investment and employment for some of the 411,000 inhabitants of this province covering 72,000 square kilometres (equivalent to Portugal, excluding the Algarve) in eastern Angola, near the border with Zambia.
In Cazombo, MCA is also involved in a project to collect and treat water from the Zambezi River to supply the population, with completion expected by July 2027.
This Ministry of Energy and Water project for the water sector covers 49 locations in five provinces, with an investment of €870 million.
RCR/AYLS // AYLS
Lusa
