Abydos Solar IPP

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The proposed investment seeks to support a 500MW solar photovoltaic (PV) project in Egypt (the “Project”).  The project will be owned and executed by AMEA Power Ltd. (‘ (“AMEA” or the “Company”), a renewable energy company, via a fully owned special vehicle company, Abydos Solar Power Company S..A.E (“Abydos”). IFC will provide up to US$100 million from its own account and the remaining debt of up to, US$165.0 million, will be provided by a mix of parallel Lenders and B Lenders.  The project is still in the design stage and is expected to be completed within 18 months after groundbreaking under a turnkey, fixed price Engineering Procurement and Construction (“EPC”) contract.  The EPC contractor is yet to be selected while construction activities are expected to commence in Q1 2022.  The plant is anticipated to be operational for 25 years.The proposed project site is located in the Aswan Governorate, around 600 km southeast of Cairo, at the most southern border of Kom Ombo District, approximately 1.5 km west of the Luxor-Aswan highway.  The 10 km2 plot where the plant will be built is on vacant, desert land owned by the Government and leased to Abydos by the New and Renewable Energy Authority (“NREA”), which is the official authority responsible for renewable energy development in Egypt.  The proposed plant is a utility grade grid-connected PV array power system, carried on a horizontal single-axis beam tracker, consisting of approximately 1 million, bifacial crystalline PV panels with anti-reflective coating. Preliminary design indicates that the plant will include central inverter stations, converting direct current from the panels to alternating current, and a substation, converting to appropriate voltage for connection directly to the national grid with no storage batteries required.  Connection to the grid will be through a 10.1 km overhead transmission line constructed and operated by the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company.  The plant will also include ancillary structures like office and data control building, warehouses and workshops, and internal roads; the plant will be completely fenced.  Access to the site is via a short connection to the existing Luxor-Aswan highway running north-south about 1.5km from the site east boundary.An ambulance station and a car repair shop, 1.,5km north east of the site along the Luxor-Aswan highway, and a number of small agricultural farms, with the closest one 5 km south of the project, are located along the highway north and south of the site.  The closest identified residential areas are the village Fares, under Kom Ombo administrative District, located approximately 20 km to the east, and Al-Mansourieh, under Daraw administrative District, 25 km to the south east.  Both villages lie on the western bank of the Nile.The project is expected to employ approximately 1,500 (peak) workers during the construction stage, of which 500 would be skilled and 1,000 unskilled, during the construction phase. During the Operation and Maintenance (“O&M”) phase, to be carried out by a specialized contractors under Abydos supervision, 20 workers, 5 skilled and 10 unskilled, are expected to be involved on site working in shifts