Damascus: The World Bank Board of Executive Directors approved a USD 146 million financing to Syria from the International Development Association (IDA) to help restore reliable, affordable electricity and support the country's economic recovery. The Syria Electricity Emergency Project (SEEP) will rehabilitate damaged transmission lines and transformer substations and provide technical assistance to support the development of the electricity sector and build the capacity of its institutions, a WB press release said.
According to Kuwait News Agency, years of conflict have crippled Syria's national grid, limiting electricity supply to 2-4 hours daily and undermining critical sectors like water, healthcare, agri-food, and housing. The electricity sector has long struggled to meet demand, especially over the past five years, leaving large segments of the population and economy in a persistent state of energy insecurity. Syria's electricity transmission and distribution infrastructure suffers from high losses and needs urgent restoration and modernization. In many areas, key substations have been either destroyed or left in disrepair, contributing to high technical losses, according to the WB statement. The lack of maintenance, spare parts, and investment has compounded the deterioration, rendering much of the backbone grid unreliable and vulnerable to frequent outages.
"Among Syria's urgent reconstruction needs, rehabilitating the electricity sector has emerged as a critical, no-regret investment that can improve the living conditions of the Syrian people, support the return of refugees and the internally displaced, enable resumption of other services such as water services and healthcare for the population and help kick-start economic recovery," said World Bank Middle East Division Director.
The project will finance the rehabilitation of high voltage transmission lines, including two critical 400 KV high-voltage interconnector transmission lines damaged during the conflict, restoring Syria's regional connectivity to Jordan and Turkiye. It will also repair damaged high-voltage transformer substations near demand centers in the most impacted areas that host the highest number of returnee refugees and internally displaced people and provide necessary spare parts and maintenance equipment.
On his part, Syrian Minister of Finance Mohammad Yisr Barnieh said, "Electricity is a foundational investment for economic progress, service delivery and livelihoods." "This is the first World Bank project in Syria in almost four decades. We hope it will lay the ground for a comprehensive and structured support program to help Syria on its path to recovery and long-term development," he added.
The Project will be implemented by the Public Establishment for Transmission and Distribution of Electricity (PETDE). Activities under the project will complement reconstruction efforts in the electricity sector, including PETDE's ongoing activities to rehabilitate distribution infrastructure and development partners' support to provide fuel supply and rehabilitate electricity generation. An international consulting firm will be recruited to act as PETDE's Owner Engineer to provide essential project management, engineering, site supervision, environmental, social, health and safety, and financial management support throughout project implementation - in line with the World Bank's regulations and standards.
The Bank will also hire a third-party monitoring agent to strengthen fiduciary and environmental and social monitoring oversight and will provide hands-on expanded implementation support to help strengthen project implementation capacity.