Electricity producer eyes new deals with lower power tariffs

Over the last decade, Aggreko Plc has grown from a market capitalisation of £450 million to over £6 billion.

Now in the FTSE 100, the UK emergency power producer, is the world’s leader in temporary power and temperature control solutions, operating in 100 countries. 

It projects strong performance in the second half of 2011 with new contracts in four countries including Kenya, Brazil, Indonesia, and Mali sustaining the order book.

The firm headquartered in Scotland, has been in Kenya since 2000 as hydropower run out of steam following a prolonged drought and was last year awarded a contract to set up a 60 megawatts (MW) plant in Muhoroni, western Kenya, adding to the 120MW of power installed as the government seeks to reduce outages.

Aggreko submitted $16.22 (Sh1,383) per kilowatt hour per month, compared to $21/kwh (Sh1,790) quoted by the second lowest bidder for the Muhoroni project.

The emergency power producer also recently won a government contract extension as part of efforts to stabilise power transmission.

Last week, it opened an office in Kenya as it scouts for new power deals to boost its profit outlook .

The firm’s CEO Rupert Soames who was in Nairobi to open the regional office talked to the Business Daily on its business prospects for the region.

Tell us briefly about your company.

We are a listed company and one of the fastest growing on the FTSE. We are present in more than 100 countries. We own some 9,000 megawatts (MW) of fleet or eight times the size of the Kenyan grid.

Our international power projects business has good momentum, and now has over 25 per cent more megawatts on rent than a year ago.

Eleven per cent of our power output is powered by Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), to cushion us from volatility in oil prices.
We have 6,000 employees , with 100 based in Nairobi.

You are setting up in Nairobi?

Kenya works well as a hub for us since the market is well regulated. Kenya is also establishing itself as an industrial hub. There is a big industrial base. Kenya has the largest Independent Power Producer (IPP) network with an estimated 400MW of installed capacity. Payments to these plants have been prompt and regulation is also very strong.

Nairobi is a good place to be for our business.