GDC reports record-setting geothermal well for Kenya
What you need to know:
GDC has reported drilling a steam well with an estimated power output of 29.6MW in Menengai.
This is just a shade less than the 30MW KenGen hit in Ol Karia in February this year, Africa's biggest.
Nine months after KenGen drilled Africa’s largest steam well in Ol Karia, the Geothermal Development Company has bored a well to match it in capacity.
Kenya is now home to the continent’s two largest geothermal steam wells, both about four times bigger than the average well.
GDC has reported drilling a steam well with an estimated power output of 29.6MW in Menengai. This is just a shade lower than the 30MW KenGen hit in Ol Karia in February this year to report the biggest well in Africa so far.
Continued prospecting to add 1,646MW of geothermal power by 2017 (as part of an initial 5,000MW target) could see even larger wells discovered.
Some of the largest geothermal wells in the world are in Indonesia and the United States, where wells producing 40MW are established.
Only about a dozen countries in Africa have geothermal potential, with Kenya and Ethiopia thought to be good for between 500MW and 5,000MW of power. Tanzania and Eritrea both have the potential for between 100MW and 500MW.
Other nations in the Greater Rift Valley region with potential include Rwanda, Burundi, DR Congo, Djibouti and Sudan (between 10MW and 100MW); and Madagascar, Mozambique, Uganda and Zambia (less than 10MW).
The World Bank and other bodies, including the Icelandic International Development Agency and the Nordic Development Fund, are supporting geothermal exploration efforts in most of these countries.
PAYE Tax Calculator
Note: The results are not exact but very close to the actual.
