To fulfil our potential, we must not fear failure.
- Low energy consumption driven by limited access, unreliability, and high cost is stifling Kenya’s economic potential
- Kenya attained low-middle income status with an average annual economic growth of 4.7% between 2015-19
- Installed electricity-generation capacity is 3 GW but demand is expected to require 10 GW by 2037
- Kenya should have energy options as its carbon emissions are insignificant
- It is the world’s fastest-growing geothermal producer with an installed capacity of 828 MW and the potential for up to 10,000 MW
- A nascent nuclear industry may also be part of way forward but it faces plenty of regulatory and other hurdles
Industrious, innovative people are essential for a country to reach its full potential. Yet a nation’s health is also defined by energy accessibility. Kenya is blessed with human brilliance and natural resources, but rampant energy poverty is a sedative, suppressing our vitality.
Let me give you an example of how it holds us down.
Most of my neighbours are farmers who rely on kerosene to light their homesteads in the evenings after labouring on their fields. Modern agriculture has allowed some people to use electricity in, for instance, poultry farming, but it is unreliable and often goes out in bad weather.
Last March, I walked into my family’s house in our village in Bungoma County’s South District only to hear complaints of a blackout that had lasted two days. Light winds had caused a tree to fall on the power lines and the utility company took days to fix it.
People were concerned not just about the outage but also the impact on their health and budgets of burning more relatively expensive kerosene in their homes.
Such local issues, though serious for the affected, are part of a much larger national deficiency.
In 2020, Kenyans used 11,462 gigawatt-hours of electricity. The installed generation capacity was around three gigawatts.
That compares very unfavourably to similarly populated South Korea (also around 50 million people) that has an installed capacity of 129.1 GW and produced 552,165 GWh in 2020.
Moving forward
The low energy consumption is intolerable for a country like ours that has made political and economic progress and has masses of potential.
Annual economic growth averaged 4.7 percent between 2015 and 2019 and Kenyans now have a per capita income of around $4,500 when adjusted for the cost of living, taking it into low middle-income status.
Management of energy resources was centralised until 2010, when the current constitution was enacted and devolution allowed regional authorities to manage their own resources, thus providing more autonomy for policy makers.
Now, the national government provides the strategy for affordable, quality energy for Kenyans through the Vision 2030 plan. Which includes projects like The Least Cost Power Development Plan for 2017 to 2037 aiming to add 7,000 megawatts, by focusing on geothermal, hydro, and coal (Fig. 1).
County governments on their part are supposed to implement national strategies for improving energy efficiency across all sectors. Their policies aim to improve local infrastructure first through the Rural Electrification and Renewable Energy Corporation, which has helped almost three-quarters of households get connected to the grid.
Increasing demand
All these policies and strategies will need to keep up with a dynamic situation.
In addition to existing needs, our transport sector will have to electrify to reduce the use of fossil fuels. Recently, the Kenya Power and Lighting Company announced plans for a national network of electric vehicle charging stations.
However, experts argue that they must first invest in the national grid to improve reliability and bring down costs, extending initiatives such as the World Bank-backed Kenya Electricity Modernization Project.
In 2017, the government expected total annual electricity demand to grow more than five times to 9.8 GW, and then to 58 GWh by 2037, an annual increase of nine percent.
To help meet demand, Kenya will import up to 2000 MW of hydropower-generated electricity from Ethiopia, with a deal already signed for 400 MW, along a 1,045 kms 500-kilovolt transmission line that the African Development Bank, one of the funders of the approximately $1.2-billion project, says will be ready for 2024. Kenya also has the operational 132-KV interconnection to Uganda.
Recently, Kenya has focused on distributed generation, with local networks and household solar. Still, it needs a modern, centralised grid. Kenya Electricity Transmission Company Limited has made progress in installing 2,424 km of transmission lines.
Renewed investment
In terms of energy generation, Kenya is investing in renewables—including Africa’s largest wind farm—but it has not got us that far yet, with prices rising.
Kenya also has plans to develop coal with private investors, with a proposed scheme in Kitui. Another project in Lamu was cancelled due to community and activist opposition.
While coal is far from the optimal solution, without a steady electricity supply, blackouts will continue to affect homes and businesses.
On our current trajectory, shortages will continue, especially during the dry season when hydropower is reduced. That sometimes leads to reduced voltage delivery resulting in power cuts (known as ‘brownouts’) due to the overloading of transformers that are connected to multiple households.
Globe warming
As a continental leader and the world’s fastest growing producer of geothermal power, Kenya’s biggest hope lies in harnessing the earth’s heat. So far, Kenya has installed 828 MW of capacity in the Rift Valley at Olkaria, Eburru, Oserian and Menengai.
The government says there is the potential for up to 10,000 MW across 14 sites. It’s targeting an installed generation capacity of 5,000 MW by 2030 by expanding Olkaria and Eburru geothermal fields and constructing additional installations at Menengai.
In 2021, the government signed a $14.5 million grant from the African Union’s Geothermal Risk Mitigation Fund for exploration and preparatory works at the state-owned Baringo-Silali project.
Atomic Africa
Along with the rest of the continent, Kenya’s contribution to climate change is negligible, meaning that, in theory, it should have few constraints on its energy choices.
Carbon emissions per capita have barely increased since the 1960s, remaining at well under half a ton per person, compared to South Korea’s 12. Kenya contributes only 16 million tons of carbon emissions per year to the global total of around 45 billion tons.
With this in mind, we need to move forward and maximize our potential, without allowing an impoverished mentality, fear of the unknown, or past failures hold us back.
We can take the example of South Africa, who developed Africa’s only nuclear plant four decades ago. According to a 2018 report by the Center for Global Development, South Africa aims to increase the share of the country’s electricity generated from nuclear from five percent to 25 percent by 2025
There is also noteworthy activity in Ghana, which is about to select a site for its first nuclear power station that it aims to have up and running by the end of the decade.
In Kenya, the Nuclear Power and Energy Agency has identified coastal Kwale and Kilifi counties as likely locations, though there is already local and civil society outcry.
Researchers have suggested that due to limited grid, regulatory, and infrastructural capacity, advanced nuclear reactors may be more suitable for Africa. Although still in the early stages of deployment, these would be easier to finance, faster to build, simpler to operate, need less water, and be less accident-prone, according to the Center for Global Development .
Nuclear need
Along with geothermal, nuclear, therefore, offers a possible way forward.
The planned project on the Swahili coast was supposed to be up and running by 2037. For that to happen, it needs full state support, which, at the moment, is faltering, as the government instead considers whether to dismantle our nuclear energy agency as part of cost-cutting measures .
For our nascent nuclear industry, there are plans to improve legal frameworks, identify an operator for the planned Kitui plant, train workers, raise public awareness, and comply with the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Steady sufficient electricity would boost not just our economic output—it would energise us.
Education is vital and The University of Nairobi’s Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology offers degree programs. Kenya has sent nuclear workers to South Korea for training, which has one of the world’s most-efficient sectors. We need partnerships so more nuclear science learning centres can be established here.
The attraction of nuclear is the same as elsewhere: like geothermal, it offers reliable, safe power. It is like an engine that never stops running.
Steady sufficient electricity would boost not just our economic output—it would energise us.
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