The announcement by the Ministry of Energy last week that all solar (and wind) grid suppliers will be required to invest in battery energy storage systems is a timely energy policy action.
For the solar grid investors, inclusion of battery energy storage will stretch availability and effective use of solar power from 12 to 24 hours, thus increasing sales and returns for solar investors. Solar generation sub-sector will definitely up their energy generation market share.
The policy requirement will transform solar generation from intermittent to join the other baseload power grid suppliers (geothermal, hydro, thermal) to support an overstretched grid system that often collapses during 6-11pm prime domestic demand time.
The need for imports of supplementary emergency supplies from neighbouring countries to stabilise the grid during peak demands will reduce making a forex saving for the country.
Enhanced grid stability will further reduce need by consumers and businesses to invest in expensive power backup capacity.
Large-scale battery energy storage is a technology that has rapidly evolved over the last 10 years, attracting significant investor attention and capital, with capacity scaling up to units upwards of 100MW.
Research and development has progressively increased battery storage density significantly transforming how energy is generated, stored, and used across all economic sectors. It is these battery technological advances that are enabling the rapid uptake of electric transportation.
Specifically for Kenya, the battery storage policy will increase uptake of renewable energy (solar and wind) in the ongoing energy transition, thus increasing Kenya’s contribution to climate mitigation efforts. This will make solar grid battery storage systems readily bankable propositions, especially with multilateral and bilateral financiers.
Battery storage systems are a fast-evolving energy subsector that requires new skills. Kenya will need to urgently establish, at TVET and university level, training for battery skills to meet growing needs across energy and other economic sub-sectors , which include power generation, transport electrification, and tens of other applications.
Such skills will also increase employability of our youth beyond Kenya. Yes, the simple electrochemistry that we studied in high school when analysing the functions of the simple radio battery has become a major line of applied science.
Supply, availability and costs of critical minerals commonly used in batteries, which include lithium, cobalt, graphite, and copper have become areas of geoeconomic and geopolitical focus. This is why Kenya should up its stake by intensifying geological surveys in search for these metals.
