Sri Lanka receives $200m wind energy boost from ADB

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved a US$200 million loan to support wind energy projects in Sri Lanka.

The finance will be activated in 2018 and will be aimed at boosting wind power generation and public–private partnerships to support renewable energy projects under the government’s clean energy programme.

The allocation was made in an update to the ADB’s Country Partnership Strategy designed to strengthen efforts to improve Sri Lanka’s economic competitiveness through environmentally sustainable growth.

In a statement, ADB said: “The Wind Power Generation Project is proposed to develop renewable energy potential and ensure energy security… The use of a public–private partnership approach will be explored for the project.”

The Banks’s Country Partnership Strategy is designed to support government targets for the sustainable development of energy resources and delivery systems to improve energy access and security.

The Bank will provide debt finance by buying debt instruments issued in the national and international market.

The Sri Lankan government is expecting the Wind Power Generation Project to help unlock the country’s substantial and largely untapped wind energy resources.

Sri Lanka has estimated its potential wind energy capacity at 35 GW and the country’s Sustainable Energy Authority has set a target to have 10 per cent of all installed energy capacity in the country based on renewables by the end of 2015.