Angola has secured €538 million in international financing to expand reliable access to treated water for around five million people.
The government is pursuing Phase 2 of the Quilonga Grande Water Supply Project to address chronic water shortages while supporting rapid urban and industrial growth around the capital, Africa Sustainability Matters reported on August 25.
Standard Chartered acted as ECA coordinator, structuring bank, sole bookrunner and mandated lead arranger for the transaction. The project is being implemented for Empresa Pública de Águas de Luanda (EPAL) under Angola's Ministry of Energy and Water, with Opaia Group participating through its construction arm within a wider consortium that also includes Casais Construction, CNT Bau and GAUFF Engineering.
The project is being developed to produce and transmit up to 518,000 cubic meters of treated water per day, drawing on the Kwanza River, with more than 100 km of transmission pipelines and multiple distribution centers.
Angola's Ministry of Energy and Water says the project has reached about 55% physical completion and is expected to begin supplying water by the end of 2026, providing approximately 350,000 new household connections.
According to Standard Chartered, the project is expected to create more than 1,500 jobs during construction, supporting local economic development.
Rapid and largely unplanned urbanization has complicated network expansion in the country, as residential areas push into peripheral municipalities and existing systems must serve consumers across greater distances. Reliable water is an input into manufacturing, construction, food processing and hospitality, while climate resilience adds another layer — reliance on the Kwanza River makes catchment management and long-term water-resource planning relevant to the project's sustainability.
Together with the Bita water system, Quilonga Grande is expected to more than double water-supply capacity in the two provinces and progressively serve around eight million people from the end of 2026.
