Mtwara–Dar es Salaam Gas Pipeline

From Global Energy Monitor
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Mtwara-Dar es Salaam Gas Pipeline is an operating natural gas pipeline.[1]

Location

The pipeline runs from Mtwara, Tanzania through Somanga, Tanzania, to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

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Project details

  • Operator: Gas Supply Company Limited (GASCO)
  • Owner: Gas Supply Company Limited (GASCO)
  • Parent Company: Gas Supply Company Limited (GASCO)
  • Capacity: 8.1 billion cubic meters per year
  • Length: 331 miles / 533 km
  • Diameter: 36 inches[2]
  • Status: Operating
  • Start year: 2015

Background

The Mtwara-Dar es Salaam Gas Pipeline is owned and operated by Gas Supply Company Limited (GASCO).[3] The pipeline was built by China Petroleum and Technology Development Company and was financed by a US$1.2 billion loan from the Exim Bank of China.[4] The Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation invested US$274.492 million into the project.[4] Construction began in June 2013, with commissioning in October 2015. The contract included the construction of the two-train gas processing plant in Madimba Village, Mtwara Region.[5]

In April 2017 a report by Tanzania's Controller and Auditor General (CAG) Mussa Assad found that the country might have trouble repaying the loan, due to lower than expected revenue from the pipeline. The CAG attributed this shortfall to the unusual decision to build the pipeline before pre-identification and pre-signing of gas service agreements with gas customers.[6]

Opposition

Violent protests against the pipeline occurred in Mtwara in January 2013,[7] and in May 2013.[8] Protestors questioned whether the project would benefit local residents.[9] According to Priya Lal, in her book African Socialism in Postcolonial Tanzania, the protests can be viewed in the context of a history of unfair and exploitative resource extraction in the region:[10]

"Officials justified the pipeline, funded by a Chinese loan, by arguing that Dar es Salaam - unlike the Southeast - already had the appropriate facilities to convert the gas to electricity and upload it to the national power grid. The fact that Mtwara was to receive a meager 0.3 percent of the total income generated by the project was harder to explain. In reaction, thousands of protesters from the Southeast staged a claim of resource sovereignty against their own government, with a delegation calling themselves the Mtwara Elders traveling to the national capital to publicly demand that the gas be processed and converted within Mtwara. Simultaneous rallies and riots in Mtwara exposed a rawer strain of popular rage met with an aggressive show of official force when the army used live ammunition against the protesters, leading to several citizen deaths."[10]

Articles and resources

References

  1. Mtwara–Dar es Salaam Natural Gas Pipeline, Wikipedia, accessed February 2018
  2. Esau (i_esau), Iain (2021-05-12). "Kenya and Tanzania revive '$1.1bn' gas export pipeline plan | Upstream Online". Upstream Online | Latest oil and gas news. Retrieved 2022-07-14.
  3. Tanzania completes Mtwara-Dar es Salaam gas pipeline, plans $200 mln mega plant, Oil and Gas, Oct. 17, 2016
  4. 4.0 4.1 Tanzania to start tests on 542km long new Mtwara-Dar gas pipeline, The East African, Jul. 25, 2015
  5. Chinese-built gas project launched in Tanzania, Xinhuanet, Oct. 12, 2015
  6. Tanzania: Repaying U.S.$1 Billion Loan May Be Difficult, Govt Told, All Africa, Apr. 23, 2017
  7. Tanzania battles deadly protests over billion-dollar gas project, Africa Review, Jan. 28, 2013
  8. Chaos hits Mtwara after gas project confirmation, The Citizen, May 22, 2013
  9. Tanzanian gas pipeline plan sparks riot-government officials, Reuters, May 22, 2013.
  10. 10.0 10.1 African Socialism in Postcolonial Tanzania: Between the Village and the World, p.228, Priya Lal, Cambridge University Press, 2015

Related GEM.wiki articles

External resources

External articles

Wikipedia also has an article on Mtwara-Dar es Salaam Gas Pipeline (Mtwara–Dar es Salaam Natural Gas Pipeline). This article may use content from the Wikipedia article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License].