A consortium led by France’s Vinci Construction has signed a EUR388m contract to build the Sambangalou hydropower dam in Senegal for the Gambia River Basin Development Organisation, which involves four countries: The Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Senegal.
Located in southeast Senegal near the Guinean border, the 91m-high dam on the Gambia River will have a generating capacity of 128MW and will improve farmland irrigation and supplying drinking water for surrounding districts. The reservoir it will create extends into Guinea.
The contract signing followed an 18-month phase of studies and preparations.
Vinci said work will begin in the first half of 2021 and is scheduled to last 48 months. At its peak, the project will employ 1,000 people recruited and trained locally.
Once complete, worksite buildings will be donated to schools. In addition, engineers from the consortium will teach classes at the Kedougou technical high school in Senegal.
The electricity generated by the dam will be injected into the grids of the four participating countries, for which Vinci will install several hundred kilometres of high voltage lines.
The consortium is composed 75% of Vinci subsidiaries and 25% of Andritz, an Austrian turbine manufacturer.