The Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) signed a project-finance loan agreement on 12 November for Gulf of Suez 3, a roughly 900MW onshore wind farm in Egypt. JBIC's share is capped at about $285mn, inside a co-financing package totalling about $588mn.
Who is lending and who is borrowing
The borrower is SHOKEIR WIND ENERGY S.A.E., an Egyptian company owned by Aeolus SAS, Engie S.A. and Orascom Construction S.A.E. Aeolus is a French company under Toyota Tsusho.
JBIC is lending alongside PROPARCO, France's overseas development finance company, and FMO, the Dutch development company. KfW-IPEX and two other commercial banks complete the group. The portions lent by private financial institutions carry insurance from NEXI, Japan's trade insurer. JBIC's release gives no tenor or interest rate for the loan.
The project
SHOKEIR will build, own and operate the plant in the Ras Shokeir area of Red Sea Governorate, on the Gulf of Suez about 300km southeast of Cairo. After completion it will sell power to the Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company for 25 years.
Gulf of Suez 3 follows the Gulf of Suez 1 and Gulf of Suez 2 onshore wind projects. JBIC's release points to its earlier press releases of December 2017 for the first project, and March 2023 and November 2024 for the second.
The policy rationale
JBIC ties the loan to Japan's "Infrastructure System Overseas Promotion Strategy 2030", which treats decarbonisation and other global social shifts as growth opportunities. It also says the financing supports Japanese industry's competitiveness by backing overseas infrastructure in which Japanese companies invest and then help operate over the long term.
On the Egyptian side, the release says the government is promoting renewables to move away from gas-fired generation, raise energy self-sufficiency and strengthen energy security. Its target is for renewable sources to make up 42% of installed generating capacity by 2030. The release does not give Toyota Tsusho's equity stake or the project's total cost.