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Kenya’s solar power growth to overtake wind through 2027
More Kenyans are resorting to alternative sources of power, particularly solar photovoltaic (PV), to take advantage of the falling prices of solar components such as panels, inverters, and batteries.
Solar power is expected to grow at an annual rate of 28 percent between 2025 and 2027, a new forecast by the International Energy Association (IEA) shows, toppling wind which has posted faster growth over the last six years.
As the price of electricity in Kenya continues to skyrocket, many customers in Kenya – including corporates and households – have increasingly resorted to alternative sources of power, particularly solar photovoltaic (PV) to take advantage of the falling prices of solar components such as panels, inverters, and batteries.
“Wind and solar PV experienced the largest yearly generation growth from 2018-2024, at 63percent and 34percent, respectively, and they are expected to continue strong growth over the 2025-2027 period, albeit at lower rates, at 12percent and 28percent, respectively,” IEA said in a newly published forecast report on Kenya.
“Several wind and solar PV projects are currently under development, including a 42 MW (Megawatts) solar PV project in the Seven Forks dam, which is expected to come online in 2027,” the association added.
Spooked by high energy costs, many power consumers in Kenya are either entirely switching to using captive power or supplementing their supply from the national grid with captive power.
Captive power plants operate by generating electricity primarily for the consumption of the owner and not for sale to the public. Data by the Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (Epra) shows that total captive power capacity in Kenya hit a historic 532.6MW in the year to June 2024.
According to the Epra data, solar PV and bioenergy are the largest sources of captive power with installed capacities of 229.2MW and 161.8MW respectively. The others are waste heat recovery (83.5MW), hydro (33MW), thermal (21.3MW), and geothermal (3.7MW).
A growing list of manufacturers in Kenya including Mabati Rolling Mills, Bio Food Products, Total Energies Kenya, Maisha Mabati Mills, Simba Cement, Unilever Tea Kenya, British American Tobacco, Africa Logistics Properties, Bidco, and Devyani Food Industries have shifted to own solar power generation to cut operational costs and lower emissions.
Besides solar PV, Kenya has an installed capacity of 436MW of wind with the Marsabit-based 300MW Lake Turkana Wind Power project being the largest followed by Kipeto Wind Power in Kiserian, Kajiado county with a generation capacity of 100MW.
Power producer KenGen also has a 25MW wind farm located on the Ngong hills on the outskirts of Nairobi.
The government targets to grow its wind energy output as part of a strategy to grow its renewable energy capacity to 100 gigawatts.
The IEA forecasts a steady growth in renewable energy in Kenya amid a host of new projects in solar PV, geothermal, and wind.
“We anticipate Kenya to continue to see strong growth in renewables, rising annually by six percent in the next three years” the association.
Geothermal power remains the largest source of electricity generation in Kenya, at 41 percent of total generation in 2024. Kenya estimates that it has about 7,000-10,000 MW of untapped geothermal energy in its Rift Valley region.
“The Geothermal Development Company aims to develop 465 MW of geothermal capacity in the Menengai steam field over five phases, providing electricity to half a million households,” IEA said.
The Menengai III plant (35 MW) began operations in 2023, and Menengai II (35 MW) is slated for completion by 2025. Additionally, Kenya aims to develop 800 MW in the Baringo Silali geothermal block and to rehabilitate some of its old geothermal power plants to increase output.
