Author: egypt69

11 deaths in Aswan and Sinai as flooding continues

CAIRO: The number of confirmed deaths in Egypt as a result of the recent floods has reached 11 Egyptians and a British tourist. There are at least 13 injured and a number of people missing since the flooding began Sunday night.

Torrential rain leading to floods hit the five governorates of North and South Sinai, the Red Sea, Aswan and Qena, with strong rains reported in Suez, Ain Sokhna and Ismailiya.

Four members of the Tarabin Bedouin tribe died Monday night in Central Sinai and three died — two Egyptian women and the British tourist — when their boat overturned in the Nile in Aswan.

The town of Al-Arish in North Sinai remains flooded, with four neighborhoods immersed in water.

Residents there are angry about the state’s inability to confront the natural disaster.

“The state has disappeared. It has not done a thing except direct traffic and nothing else,” North Sinai Tagammu party member Khalil Jabr Sawarkeh told Daily News Egypt. “It builds fancy office buildings and offers no services.”

Residents of Al-Arish used their own vehicles to transport sand to create makeshift barriers to block the water from entering the downtown area.

The North Sinai governor’s office, which was due to host meetings with prominent Bedouin leaders Monday, announced that it had set up an operations room to combat the effects of the flood.

In Central Sinai, six villages have been completely submerged in water and its residents have left their homes. Five ports have been closed around the country due to the bad weather, including Sharm El-Sheikh and Ain Sokhna ports.

According to the Associated Press, the heavy rains also washed away a dozen mud brick homes in southern Egypt and killed two women there. Scores of families in Aboul Rish village in Aswan slept overnight outdoors after their homes were destroyed.

In the famed monument city of Luxor, just to the north, the bad weather caused power failures in several neighborhoods and disrupted Nile cruises, sailboat and ferry schedules.

In Israel, a woman drowned when her car was caught in a flash flood in the south, where stormy weather also blocked the main road to the Red Sea resort of Eilat.

A bridge also collapsed near a cargo crossing between Egypt and Israel

Sinai is susceptible to torrential rainfall at this time of year, and due to poor or absent drainage in towns like Al-Arish, streets are often flooded with water.

Additionally, being a mountainous region, with sharp inclines and declines on the road, the un-drained water travels over large distances.

Areas on the border were also hit hard by the floods, with deaths reported in Gaza and Israel. The Hamas government in Gaza declared a state of emergency in the territory and evacuated families in the Gaza Valley.

Egypt-based Taqa Arabia, through its power unit, Global Energy, has signed an agreement with Sudanese Pension Fund and Asec Cement Co. to set up a joint venture power-generation operation in Sudan. Under a 20-year offtake agreement, the new company, Berber for Electrical Power, will have a total installed capacity of 42 megawatts and will provide all the electricity needs for Takamol, Asec’s 1.6 million tonne per annum greenfield cement plant in Sudan. The cost of the project is estimated at $67m, the company said.

http://www.ameinfo.com/221399.html

Global Energy, the power arm of Taqa Arabia, has concluded an agreement to create a joint venture power-generation operation in Sudan in partnership with ASEC Cement and the Sudanese Pension Fund, company officials announced today.

The new venture, Berber for Electrical Power, will have a total installed capacity of 42 megawatts and will provide all the electricity needs for Takamol, ASEC Cement’s 1.6 million ton per annum greenfield cement plant in Sudan, under a 20-year offtake agreement. Takamol is located 14 kilometers west of Fahalb on the west bank of the River Nile. The new venture will be in operation next month.

"This agreement is the first major milestone in Global Energy’s regional expansion drive," noted Taqa Arabia Chief Executive Officer Khaled Abubakr. "It comes as part of our regional expansion strategy, which has already seen our gas arm establish a footprint across several countries in the Middle East and North Africa. We will continue to look for attractive regional investment opportunities going forward. I would like to extend special thanks and appreciation to the Sudanese government for its assistance."

Taqa Arabia is Citadel Capital’s Platform Company for investment in the energy distribution sector across the Middle East and Africa, with a focus on gas and electricity distribution as well as the storage and distribution of refined products.

Dr. Magdy Saleh, Managing Director of Taqa Arabia’s power arm, added, "51% of Berber’s equity will be held by Global Energy, which brings in its technical knowhow and management expertise as a licensed company for power generation and distribution. A further 25% will be held by the Sudanese Pension Fund, while ASEC Cement will own the balance."

Under the terms of the joint venture, Berber will build, own, operate and maintain a heavy-fuel-oil-fired captive power plant, which carries an estimated investment cost of $67m.

"Conclusion of this joint venture is a vital step for Takamol as we speed toward the start of production this year," noted ASEC Cement CEO Giorgio Bodo. "Locking in our energy supply with a trusted partner such as Taqa Arabia will allow us to proceed with final kit-out at the site and as we enter operational testing in the coming weeks."

ASEC Cement, a Portfolio Company of ASEC Holding, is Citadel Capital’s platform investment for a leading regional cement production group that will control 12 million tons of cement per annum by 2013 in six countries spanning from Algeria to Iraq-Kurdistan.

Takamol will be the most technologically advanced cement production plant in Sudan when it comes on-stream in 2010 to supply the needs of that nation’s fast-growing market.

http://www.ameinfo.com/221376.html