Lebanon to sign electricity deal with Jordan next week

Crisis-hit Lebanon will sign a deal with Jordan next week to bring in electricity via Syria to help ease gruelling power cuts, the energy minister has said.

The agreement, which comes as the country grapples with round-the-clock power outages, is part of a wider government effort to eventually provide state electricity for eight to 10 hours a day, up from just two now in most parts of the country.

"The deal is important primarily because it will increase state power supply, which is cleaner and cheaper" than electricity produced by "expensive and polluting private generators", Walid Fayad said in an interview on Thursday. 

The minister said a visiting Jordanian delegation would sign the deal in Beirut next Wednesday before heading to Damascus, where Jordanian and Lebanese officials are set to ink a transit agreement with Syria.

The deal will provide Lebanon with up to 250 megawatts of electricity during the day and 150 megawatts at night, equivalent to a total of two additional hours of power, Fayad said.

Two years into Lebanon's economic meltdown, the cash-strapped state is struggling to purchase fuel for its power stations.

With state power effectively non-existent, many rely on private generators, but prices have increased after the government lifted fuel subsidies.

Lebanon has been importing fuel oil from Iraq to operate its power plants in recent months.

The government is also in talks with Egypt to import gas through the Arab Gas Pipeline, which passes through Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. 

Beirut and Cairo are currently finalising commercial agreements so that the two sides can sign a deal by spring, according to Fayad.