Lebanons Ministry of Energy and Water has signed a US$348mn contract with a Danish-German consortium to build new power plants in Jiyyeh and Zouk
Under the contract, Danish BWSC and German Man Diesel would build two plants with a combined maximum capacity of 272MW.
Gebran Bassil, the country's energy minister, said that the construction would take 15 to 18 months.
"The new plants would run on both fuel oil and natural gas," he remarked.
UK bank HSBC and the EKF, Denmark's export credit agency, have reportedly offered to provide an extended loan for the projects. It was initially planned that the Lebanese government would directly fund the projects.
The Ministry of Energy and Water had made an announcement in May 2012 about a US$1.2bn project to produce an additional 700MW of electricity. This was the first of a larger US$4.87bn comprehensive plan launched in 2012 to provide more than 4,000MW by 2014 and 5,000MW by 2015.
