The Arab Republic of Egypt is a populous country in North Africa and the Arab region and home to one of the fastest-growing populations globally with a population of 97.55 million and an area of 1,001,450 km2. The main spoken language is Arabic, and the population is mainly concentrated along the narrow Nile Valley and Delta. About 99% of the population uses around 5.5% of the total land area.
Egypt is a lower-middle income country and economic activity is concentrated in the services, industrial and agricultural sectors, with respective contributions of 55%, 33% and 12% to gross domestic product (GDP).
Egypt’s fossil fuel energy resource endowments (including oil, natural gas and negligible amounts of low-quality coal) are limited. As of end-2014, total proven reserves of petroleum energy (crude oil and natural gases) stood at about 14.8 billion barrels of oil equivalent, of which 3.4 billion were in the form of crude oil and about 11.4 billion of natural gas.
Egypt has an abundant resource of renewable energy: mainly hydro, wind, solar and biomass. Hydro power is the third largest energy source after natural gas and oil. As of 2019, the installed capacity of hydro power in the country was 2,842 MW contributing to about 8% of the total electricity generation mix. Most of the country’s hydroelectricity comes from the Aswan High Dam and the Aswan Reservoir Dams across the Nile River. The Gulf of Suez has abundant wind power resources and an installed capacity of 1130 MW in 2019.
Egypt has the benefit of favorable solar radiation intensity. The country enjoys between 2,900 and 3,200 hours of sunshine annually, with an annual direct normal intensity of 1,970 - 3,200 kWh/m2 and a total radiation intensity varying between 2,000 and 3,200 kWh/m2 /year from north to south. Egypt is one of the most suitable regions for exploiting solar energy both for electricity generation and thermal heating applications.
The Renewable Energy strategy aims at increasing the share of generated energy from renewables to 20% out of the total installed capacity in Egypt by 2022, out of which 6% will come from hydro sources, 12% from wind and 2% from solar energy.
The country has a number of solar parks installed, the latest being the Benban Solar Park, financed by the World Bank and other international financing institutions, which is the country’s largest one. The park comprises 32 developers to install 32 power stations across a 37 km2 site with a planned generation capacity of 1465 megawatts of electricity.