NamPower Grid Expansion Targets Southern Africa Power

Namibia’s state-owned utility is pressing ahead with a multi-billion-dollar NamPower grid expansion, signalling a decisive upgrade of one of southern Africa’s more constrained power systems to support new generation, mining and industrial loads.

Digital backbone and regional links

NamPower this week inaugurated the Sekelduin Substation at Swakopmund, a N$394 million (about US$21 million) facility the utility describes as Africa’s first digital substation. The substation will act as the main transmission supply point for Swakopmund and Tamarisk, the NamWater South bulk water scheme that feeds the Husab uranium mine, and the Erongo RED distribution network.

Managing Director Kahenge Haulofu used the ceremony to set out a dense pipeline of projects under the company’s Transmission Master Plan. The programme aligns transmission timing with both NamPower builds and independent power producer (IPP) projects so that lines and substations are in place as new capacity connects to the grid.

At the core sits the 400 kV Auas–Kokerboom transmission line, a N$2 billion (about US$108 million) scheme to strengthen the backbone between Auas substation near Dordabis and Kokerboom near Keetmanshoop. The line will improve north–south power transfers and is scheduled for commissioning in the second half of 2028. For investors, this is the kind of long-lead asset that underpins both future IPP integration and potential regional wheeling.

Cross-border connectivity is also being expanded. The 400 kV Obib–Oranjemund transmission line, costed at about N$1.2 billion (US$65 million), will become Namibia’s second interconnector with Eskom‘s grid in South Africa. NamPower expects to commission the line this year, reinforcing import and export options at a time when the Southern African Power Pool remains tight. This new corridor should enhance Namibia’s position as both an off-taker and a potential transit market for emerging renewables in the region.

NamPower reports that it now owns and operates more than 12,060 kilometres of transmission lines ranging from 66 kV to 400 kV, which it describes as a world-class system largely planned, built and maintained by Namibian professionals. That scale gives the utility a strong physical platform to support the next phase of domestic generation and cross-border trade.

Urban, mining and regional demand in focus

Alongside regional lines, the NamPower grid expansion is targeting fast-growing load centres. In Windhoek, the utility and the City of Windhoek are co-funding the 220/66 kV Khomas Substation, a N$340 million (around US$18 million) project that will strengthen supply to the capital. Commissioning is planned for later this year, which should ease capacity constraints in the city’s growing industrial and residential zones.

In the Erongo Region, NamPower and Erongo RED are jointly financing the 220/66 kV Erongo Substation, budgeted at N$170 million (about US$9 million), to increase and stabilise supply in one of Namibia’s fastest-growing economic hubs. The region combines heavy mining loads, logistics activity and tourism, making grid stability central to investment decisions.

To support the north-east, NamPower has completed the 220/132 kV Masivi Substation at a cost above N$330 million (around US$18 million). The substation strengthens supply to the Kavango and surrounding regions, where new agricultural and small industrial projects are emerging.

Haulofu framed this investment wave as a response to rising demand driven by industrialisation, new mining projects and population growth. For institutional investors and lenders, the message is of a vertically integrated utility moving ahead with the enabling infrastructure needed for utility-scale solar, potential green hydrogen projects and further base-metal and uranium developments. The co-funding structures with municipal and regional distributors, plus the enhanced Eskom link, suggest scope for future blended finance and private participation in generation and wheeling.

As the NamPower grid expansion progresses, investors will watch execution risk, cost discipline and the pace of IPP connections. However, if the current build-out keeps to schedule, Namibia’s grid should be better positioned by the end of this decade to anchor larger renewable pipelines and more sophisticated regional power trading structures.

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