Congo Businessman Plans Hydropower Plants to Help Copper Miners

  • Power shortage reducing copper output by 50,000 tons a year
  • Privately developed power plant would be country's first
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A Congolese businessman plans to develop a hydropower project in southeastern Democratic Republic of Congo to supply electricity to the region’s mines. By doing so he would establish a new model for electricity projects in the country.

Africa’s biggest copper producer is almost the size of Western Europe, though it only has installed power-generating capacity of 2,442 megawatts -- about the same as Panama’s. Only half that capacity is functioning.