431-i. Review of Western Uganda Hydropower and Rural Electrification and ESIA Report Project - Uganda

An interim ESIA report has been prepared for the Western Uganda Hydropower and Rural Electrification Project. The Ugandan Ministry of Finance Planning and Economic Development (MoFPED) obtained a Grant from the ORIO Infrastructure Development Fund of the Government of Netherlands. The project aims at developing a cluster of 10 mini-hydropower plants of a capacity between 0.5MW to 2.0 MW and rural electrification systems to connect about 347,000 people in Western Uganda. ORIO requested that the NCEA review the interim ESIA report, with the aim to provide additional guidelines and recommendations for the final draft ESIA report.

Advisory reports and other documents

Significant details

Clearly this interim ESIA is not yet complete. Main elements which are still missing are:

• There is no justification of choice of power generation mode (why not solar, wind, geothermic), nor any reference to possible mode choice made in the Ugandan energy policy. There is no reference either to this project being mentioned in the Rural Electrification Plan 2013-2022.
• It does not become clear how the selection for the sites was done and whether and how environmentally sensitive areas were taken into consideration;
• The technology used (run off river) is not indicated and the % of river flow used is not mentioned
• The specific interventions at each location are not described, e.g. in terms of technical design.
• This information is essential to the more detailed impact assessments which are still to follow, and will be the basis for a sound Environmental (and Social) Management Plan and Monitoring Plan (these are currently still lacking).
• Public consultation has taken place but has not been documented and is therefore not verifiable.
• The baseline information is rather comprehensive, but needs to be presented in a more accessible manner. There is a disbalance between socio-economic and environmental information. E.g. there is no baseline for species that will suffer most impacts (fish).

Parties involved

Members of the working group

Technical secretary: Ineke Steinhauer

Further details

Country: Uganda

Last modified: 12 Apr 2019