China Energy Engineering Corporation (CEEC) is looking to invest USD 1 bn in Egypt over the next five years in desalination, renewables, and energy storage, Chairman Ni Zhen told Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Plus summit. The company is also in talks with the Electricity Ministry over the possibility of investing in power generation, Zhen said.

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Gov’t backing: The government will offer the company incentives and is pushing it to help localize components for renewables and desalination as Egypt works to meet an additional 5-6 GW of annual demand for renewable energy. Also part of the government’s energy and desalination plans are exporting power to Europe, boosting renewables to 20% of the energy mix in FY 2025-2026, and ramping up desalination to 10 mn cubic meters a day within five years — up from 1.4 mn cubic meters a day.

CEEC’s footprint in Egypt: The company has carried out 14 projects in Egypt since it set foot into the market in 2009 and moved its regional HQ to Cairo.

ANOTHER CHINESE PLAYER IS INTERESTED IN DESALINATION-

China’s Jiangsu Fenghai New Energy Seawater Desalination Development Company is also mulling bringing its renewable energy-powered desalination model with a daily capacity of 10k cubic meters to Egypt, according to a statement. The company is also willing to scale up daily production capacity to meet Egypt’s needs. To move forward, Madbouly proposed direct coordination between Egyptian authorities and the company to explore cooperation.

THAT’S NOT ALL- Madbouly also met with Teda Chairman Qu Defu to discuss expanding the Chinese industrial developer’s footprint in Egypt, according to a separate statement. The company is set to receive more land in the Suez Canal Economic Zone, with potential new sites in New Alamein and the new capital also on the table.

REMEMBER- Teda Egypt will invest USD 100 mn to develop infrastructure on a 2.9 sq km industrial plot in the Sokhna Industrial Zone in partnership with the Main Development Company. Teda Egypt is also nearing completion of its previously allocated 7.3 sqm Teda zone.

DATA POINT- Teda Egypt’s industrial zone has attracted USD 3 bn in investment from 200 firms over the past decade, generating over 10k jobs.

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