Hydrobox

ElectriFI provided a senior debt in the amount of USD 2 million to Hydrobox to support eight small hydro projects across four mini-grids in Kenya, providing over 10,000 people and local businesses with reliable, affordable electricity.

Project overview

Hydrobox develops and operates minigrids powered by small, run-of-river hydropower or hybrid hydro/solar plants across Kenya and operated as an anchor-business-customer (ABC) business model.

Hydrobox currently has 3 operating hydro plants (interconnected in 1 minigrid), and a pipeline of 6 additional hydro assets, powering 5 minigrids in total, for a total installed capacity of 2.3MW, to be built overthe coming 12-18 months.

Funding objective

ElectriFI will provide a senior loan facility to Hydrobox Infrastructures in Kenya, to expand its portfolio of minigrids in rural Kenya.

Investment rationale

ElectriFI supports this investment for the following reasons: (i) hydro-based minigrids are a perfect solution in areas where the resource allows, as they allow for a very low LCOE and a good base load, (ii) the ABC business model is well-suited to sufficiently scale the generation assets and guarantee demand and iii) high long-term impact with 2582 new physical connections (~11,130 beneficiaries), total GHG avoidance of 17,772 tCO2 and 297 jobs created.

More info:

• Disclosure
• Hydrobox