He wants his party to match its 19th-century forebears in engineering, in infrastructure, in building.
"The renewable energy community has argued that what is needed is a rapid phase-out, because then it's clear that money needs to be invested in a new grid infrastructure, in building offshore wind parks," argues Miranda Schreurs, director of the Environmental Policy Research Centre at the Free University of Berlin.
Last month in another report, the inspector general criticized lack of progress by the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund in building American-financed infrastructure projects.
One of Brazil's big problems is its poor infrastructure, especially in building roads and ports.
A spokesman said: "Our infrastructure investment in building networks across the UK helps stimulate economic growth and benefits consumers and businesses alike".
Mr Osborne, who will outline £12bn of welfare cuts, will promise to be "bold in transforming education, bold in reforming welfare, bold in delivering infrastructure, bold in building the Northern Powerhouse, bold in backing the aspirations of working people… it is a Budget that sets the way to secure Britain's future".
"The government should invest money in building infrastructure rather than wasting money pretending that infrastructure is being built when we know there has been a 20% decline in public infrastructure investment since it was elected," he said.
Senegal has additional sources of technical expertise that it can draw on to expand infrastructure networks in the country, as well as a long tradition of engaging the military in building infrastructure.
The prime minister, Meles Zenawi, has made some progress in building infrastructure, tackling poverty and attracting foreign investment.
In theory PFIs should provide better value for money than conventional government procurement and transfer much of the risk in building infrastructure from the state to private firms.
