Saudi Arabia-based Islamic Development Bank has lent Morocco $196.4 million to partially finance a power plant, Moroccan government officials said on Friday. The gas-fired power station would be located in the coastal city of Kenitra, 40 km north of the capital Rabat, they said. Morocco plans to invest more than $10 billion over the next five years to expand power generation capacity to meet increased demand for electricity at home and in Europe. Last year, Morocco's state power utility ONE signed a deal with Algerian counterpart Sonelgaz to export electricity to Spain by building a power grid link via neighboring Morocco. ONE, which doubled the capacity of its interconnector to Spain to 1400 MW in 2007, has a Spanish power market trading license.
