Renewable energy - The Times Of Central Asia

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Renewable energy

Acwa and KOWEPO Explore Renewable Energy Projects in Uzbekistan

South Korea’s KOWEPO, which is wholly owned by state-controlled Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO), is moving into Uzbekistan’s rapidly expanding green energy market alongside Saudi Arabia’s Acwa, one of the market’s largest players. No specific projects have been announced yet, but the companies will explore opportunities in renewable generation and energy storage while considering the possibility of attracting South Korean financing. The memorandum was signed in Tashkent on August 25. For KOWEPO, the agreement offers an opportunity to bring to Central Asia the experience it has gained through projects in the Middle East totaling 3.5 GW of renewable capacity and 877 MW of gas-fired generation. For Acwa, Uzbekistan has already become its second-largest market after Saudi Arabia. The company has operated there since 2019 and is developing 19 projects with a combined capacity of more than 10 GW and potential investment estimated at $15 billion. Abid Malik, Acwa’s president for Central Asia, said the companies would also seek to “facilitate engagement with Korean financial institutions” as they assess potential projects. Acwa’s portfolio in Uzbekistan includes solar and wind power, conventional generation, green hydrogen, and energy storage. Storage is becoming increasingly important as the share of solar and wind grows because utility-scale batteries can store surplus electricity and return it to the grid when renewable generation falls. Uzbekistan aims to expand renewable energy capacity to around 25 GW by 2030, with renewables targeted to account for 54% of electricity generation. The rapid construction of solar and wind farms comes as electricity demand rises and Uzbekistan seeks to modernize a power system that has historically relied heavily on gas-fired generation. Acwa has already secured contractual priority to develop up to 2 GWh of new battery energy storage capacity in the country. KOWEPO could therefore provide additional expertise and capital. Uzbekistan’s energy transition has already attracted major investors from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, China, and elsewhere. For now, the agreement with KOWEPO remains a framework arrangement, with the capacity, cost, locations, and timelines of any joint projects yet to be announced. Its practical significance will become clearer if the companies move from exploring opportunities to concrete investment decisions.

opinion

Can Uzbekistan’s Green Transition Offset Its Gas Decline?

Uzbekistan faces a widening energy gap. Natural gas production peaked in 2008 and, after a partial recovery in the late 2010s, has fallen sharply. Official figures show output dropped from 61.6 billion cubic meters (bcm) in 2018 to 41.5 bcm in 2024. Production fell another 15% year on year in the first quarter of 2026. The gap is already being filled from abroad. Russian gas deliveries rose 15% in 2025 to nearly 6.5 bcm, while Uzbekistan also imports gas from Turkmenistan. Renewable electricity cannot replace every household or industrial use of gas. It can reduce the volume burned in power stations, leaving more domestic fuel available elsewhere. Declining output is already changing Uzbekistan’s external position. The country, once a net gas exporter, became a net importer in 2023. Imports help protect households and factories from shortages, but they add costs and increase exposure to Russian and Turkmen supplies. Renewable generation therefore serves an energy security purpose even before its climate benefits are counted. Natural gas remains the central concern. In its 2022 review, the International Energy Agency said it provided about 85% of Uzbekistan’s total energy and electricity supplies. The government expected gas demand to rise by 30% to 65 bcm by 2030, while electricity demand would roughly double. The IEA also warned that reserves would last fewer than 20 years at the production rate then prevailing. This was a reserve-to-production estimate, not a fixed depletion date. New discoveries or investment could extend it. Lower consumption would do the same. The government has responded with a rapid renewable buildout. In 2025, solar and wind plants generated more than 10.5 billion kWh of electricity. Renewable generation, including hydropower, reached 16.8 billion kWh. The Ministry of Energy said this saved about 3.2 bcm of natural gas. That saving was equivalent to roughly half the volume Russia supplied during the year. It shows that renewables already ease the shortage. Yet 3.2 bcm remains far below the roughly 20 bcm fall in annual gas production since 2018. On current figures, the green transition is slowing the impact of the decline, not yet offsetting it. The buildout forms part of Uzbekistan’s 2019 Green Economy Transition Strategy. Renewable projects bring foreign investment and create opportunities for domestic suppliers. In December 2025, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev said local companies had supplied $700 million of materials and electrical equipment while also providing services to energy projects. Renewable generation also limits import demand by reducing the gas burned in power stations. Large projects depend heavily on decisions by the state. Procurement and land allocation affect who receives contracts. Grid access and investment approvals shape how quickly plants are completed. RFE/RL has documented concerns over opaque subcontracting in Uzbekistan’s solar sector. Its 2024 investigation found that two subcontractors on the Sherabad project were absent from publicly available documents. One company had been incorporated only two days after construction began. A founder denied accusations of corruption, while principal contractor Masdar did not respond to questions. The investigation did not establish that the...

Electricity supply

Kazakhstan Targets End to Electricity Deficit by 2027

Just days after a major disruption hit power systems across Central Asia, Kazakhstan reaffirmed its plan to fully cover domestic electricity demand by the first quarter of 2027. By the end of next year, the Energy Ministry expects the country to have a surplus of about 1.3 billion kWh. That margin would still leave relatively little room for error because it is equivalent to only about 1% of the electricity Kazakhstan consumed in 2025, when demand grew by 3.8%. The August 14 outage affected parts of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan. Power was cut to some consumers in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city, which has a population of about 2.4 million. The precise chain of events remains unclear. Kazakhstan’s national grid operator KEGOC said the disruption began when two hydrogenerators at Kyrgyzstan’s Toktogul Hydropower Plant shut down, sharply changing power flows and overloading Kazakhstan’s North-East-South transmission corridor. Kyrgyzstan’s Energy Ministry later acknowledged that the Toktogul shutdown was the initial disturbance but said it should not automatically be treated as the direct cause of the subsequent outages elsewhere in Central Asia. A special commission is investigating the incident, although public statements so far have not identified its chair. The outage exposed a risk in regional grid connections. Kazakhstan’s grid is connected to Russia and neighboring Central Asian systems. These links allow electricity to move across borders, but a sudden loss of generation or a major transmission failure can also affect several countries in quick succession. Kazakhstan has been a net electricity importer for several years. In 2025, the country generated 123.1 billion kWh and consumed 124.6 billion kWh. Electricity imports from Russia totaled 4.64 billion kWh, compared with exports of 2.16 billion kWh in the opposite direction. The net inflow from Russia fell from 3.41 billion kWh in 2024 to 2.48 billion kWh in 2025. Electricity consumption increased by 3.8% in 2025, while peak demand reached a record 17.724 GW on December 18. Kazakhstan is also seeking to attract energy-intensive industries and large data centers. Those expectations are reflected in longer-term development plans, which already include 7.8 GW of new and modernized coal-fired generation by 2030, with investment estimated at more than $15.5 billion. The authorities expect to close the remaining short-term deficit by rapidly commissioning new generating capacity. Around 2.6 GW is scheduled to come online in 2026. Four gas-fired power plants and expansion projects at two existing power stations account for part of that capacity, while ten new renewable energy facilities are also planned. The Energy Ministry says these projects should allow Kazakhstan to fully meet its electricity needs by the end of the first quarter of 2027. A further 845 MW is planned for 2027, of which 570 MW would come from renewable projects. By the end of that year, the ministry expects an electricity surplus of around 1.3 billion kWh. Renewable energy is expanding alongside Kazakhstan’s continued reliance on conventional generation. Thermal power plants accounted for 74.4% of electricity generation in 2025. Solar and wind facilities, along with biogas plants, provided 6.1%. The...

Energy Investment

Kazakhstan’s Energy Sector Without Local Business: The Anatomy of Major Projects

In late June 2026, construction began on a 1 GW wind power plant in Kazakhstan’s Zhambyl Region. The project is valued at $1.4 billion. Companies based in the United Arab Emirates, Masdar and W Solar, hold 80% of the project, while Kazakhstan’s quasi-state sector holds the remaining 20% through Qazaq Green Power and the Kazakhstan Investment Development Fund. This ownership model has become typical across Kazakhstan’s energy industry. Nearly all major new energy infrastructure projects rely on foreign capital. The country’s largest renewable energy developments involve international investors, including France’s TotalEnergies and Saudi Arabia’s ACWA Power. Even when agreements collapse, the government continues to rely on foreign partners. After financing problems ended cooperation with Russia’s Inter RAO, construction of new thermal power plants in Semey and Ust-Kamenogorsk was quickly reassigned to a Kazakh-Singapore consortium. A similar pattern appears across the sector: foreign investors provide most of the capital and technology, while Kazakhstan’s state-linked companies take minority stakes through Samruk-Kazyna or its subsidiaries This has created an unusual situation. Despite an acute shortage of generating capacity and guaranteed long-term demand, Kazakhstan’s largest private businesses have largely stayed away from electricity generation. Instead, domestic capital continues to favor sectors with greater liquidity and shorter investment horizons, ranging from finance to residential real estate. The reasons lie in straightforward economics, where financing costs and regulatory conditions outweigh the sector’s potential returns. The Financial Equation Power generation is one of the most capital-intensive infrastructure industries, with investment payback periods typically ranging from 10 to 15 years. Such projects require access to long-term financing at low interest rates. For Kazakhstan’s private sector, those financing instruments are largely unavailable. Under the National Bank’s tight monetary policy, with the benchmark interest rate standing at 17%, commercial borrowing costs for businesses routinely exceed 20% annually. Financing the construction of a power plant with local-currency loans at those rates is, mathematically, unviable. Such projects are virtually guaranteed to become unprofitable. Rather than engaging in complex, long-term infrastructure financing, Kazakhstan’s banking sector has increasingly concentrated on faster and more profitable lending. Official statistics from the National Bank of Kazakhstan illustrate this imbalance. As of May 2026, banks’ claims on households had reached approximately $60 billion, while lending to non-financial private enterprises, the real economy,stood at about $29 billion, less than half that amount. In practice, commercial banks have largely withdrawn from financing major industrial investment projects, preferring consumer lending with higher liquidity and quicker returns. Foreign corporations, meanwhile, enter Kazakhstan with access to international capital markets. They secure financing from global development institutions or sovereign wealth funds in their home countries at significantly lower borrowing costs. As a result, domestic private investors often lose the competitive race before projects even reach the investment decision stage. Unequal Conditions for Investors A second obstacle for domestic investors lies in Kazakhstan’s regulatory framework. Electricity tariffs have historically been kept under government control to limit inflationary pressures and avoid sharp increases in household utility bills and production costs. To attract major international energy companies,...

Rogun Hydropower Plant

World Bank Approves New $300 Million Grant for Tajikistan’s Rogun Hydropower Project

The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors has approved a second phase of financing for Tajikistan’s Rogun Hydropower Plant, providing a $300 million grant to support construction of what is expected to become the largest power station in Central Asia. According to the World Bank, the new funding from the International Development Association will finance civil works, electromechanical equipment for electricity generation, project implementation support, and environmental and social measures, including resettlement assistance and livelihood restoration for affected households. The financing will also support reservoir monitoring, forecasting systems, and flood-risk management for downstream communities. The Rogun project is expected to generate 14,400 gigawatt-hours of renewable electricity annually, equivalent to roughly 60% of Tajikistan’s current electricity generation. The World Bank said the plant will help reduce the country’s chronic winter electricity shortages, improve access to reliable power for around 10 million people, create more than 30,000 direct and indirect jobs, and enable electricity exports to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. “In addition to reducing chronic power shortages, increased access to reliable electricity from the Rogun HPP will help power economic transformation and create jobs in Tajikistan,” said Najy Benhassine, the World Bank’s director for Central Asia. “By increasing the supply of clean electricity, this transformational project will help power homes, businesses, and public services, creating employment opportunities in the country.” The World Bank also said increased electricity exports would strengthen regional energy trade. “By facilitating electricity exports, the Rogun HPP will help revitalize the regional power market, allowing Central Asian countries to use their energy assets more efficiently,” said Charles Cormier, the bank’s director for infrastructure in Europe and Central Asia. “Enhanced regional connectivity is expected to reduce supply constraints in the region and contribute to improved reliability and energy security.” At the request of the government of Tajikistan, the World Bank is coordinating international support for the project through the Rogun Coordination Group. The group includes development partners that have approved or expressed interest in supporting the project, including the Asian Development Bank, Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, European Investment Bank, Islamic Development Bank, OPEC Fund, and several Gulf-based development funds. The latest financing comes as the project continues to face environmental scrutiny. Last year, The Times of Central Asia reported that the World Bank’s Inspection Panel had registered and reviewed a complaint concerning the bank’s involvement in the Rogun project. The complaint was submitted by the environmental coalition Rivers Without Boundaries on behalf of communities living downstream in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. The complainants argued that the project’s environmental and social assessments were outdated and did not fully evaluate potential downstream impacts. Environmental groups warned that filling the Rogun reservoir could reduce water flow to the Amu Darya delta, potentially accelerating desertification, increasing soil salinity, and affecting livelihoods in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. In November 2025, environmental groups criticized the World Bank Board after it declined to authorize a full investigation, despite an Inspection Panel recommendation for a comprehensive review. The World Bank has said the project is subject to environmental and social safeguards,...

Energy Security

Kazakhstan Expects to Double Renewable Energy Capacity by 2029

Kazakhstan expects to fully meet domestic electricity demand by early 2027 and move into a stable power surplus by 2029, partly through a planned doubling of renewable energy capacity, Energy Minister Yerlan Akkenzhenov said at a government meeting. Akkenzhenov said Kazakhstan’s power system currently includes 254 generation facilities, including 172 renewable energy installations. Conventional energy sources still dominate the country’s power mix. Coal-fired plants account for 13.7 gigawatts (GW) of installed capacity, gas-fired plants for 7.1 GW, and large hydropower stations for 2.5 GW. Kazakhstan’s total installed generating capacity stands at 27.1 GW, while renewable energy facilities account for 3.8 GW. Kazakhstan generated a record 123.1 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity last year, while consumption reached 124.6 billion kWh. This year, output is expected to rise further to 126.5 billion kWh, the ministry said. The gap between production and consumption has been narrowing steadily, and the government plans to commission 13.3 GW of new capacity by the end of 2029, including 5.9 GW from renewable energy sources. “By 2029, 13.3 GW of new capacity will be commissioned. Of this volume, 12.56 GW will come from entirely new generation facilities, while 0.74 GW will replace existing capacity,” Akkenzhenov said. “The commissioning of new facilities will allow us to fully meet the economy’s electricity demand starting from early 2027, followed by a surplus. This additional generation will also support energy-intensive artificial intelligence infrastructure and large data centers,” he added. Under Kazakhstan’s Energy Sector Development Plan through 2035, the government also plans to introduce more than 26.3 GW of additional generating capacity. The ministry said the decision to build new facilities is based on long-term projections of rising electricity demand. Kazakhstan is also implementing a national project to expand coal-fired generation using what officials describe as cleaner coal technologies in line with environmental regulations. That program includes investment projects with a combined installed capacity of around 7.8 GW. Key projects include the construction of the Ekibastuz GRES-3 power plant, a thermal power station in Kurchatov, and three new combined heat and power plants in Kokshetau, Semey, and Ust-Kamenogorsk. In total, the national energy project includes 19 initiatives, eight new projects and 11 focused on the expansion and modernization of existing facilities. As previously reported by The Times of Central Asia, Kazakhstan’s electricity deficit was projected to reach 5.7 billion kWh in January 2025, up from 2.4 billion kWh a year earlier. The country currently imports most of its shortfall from Russia and signed an agreement with Tajikistan in May 2025 to import electricity from the Rogun Hydropower Plant.