Economy

Ministry cuts power generation target by 2,800MW

keter

Energy Secretary Charles Keter. FILE PHOTO | NMG

The Ministry of Energy has cut its generation target by 2,800 megawatts amid growing demand risk concerns for 2030 electricity consumption level.

Energy Secretary Charles Keter said the ministry had taken the step in line with the demand forecasts. The ministry had initially indicated Kenya needed to generate additional 10,000 megawatts to accommodate the Vision 2030 flagship projects.

“It is not necessary to have in our records these targets that we cannot achieve so we have revised it down to 7,200 megawatts and this will be achieved through various innovative approaches to power generation,” he said.

Mr Keter, who was attending the Seventh Global Innovation seminar organised by the Kenya Electricity Generation Company, said the ministry was engaging other relevant State agencies to boost energy usage by large industries to ensure the target to connect all households by 2022 remains sustainable.

When it assumed power in 2013, the Jubilee government set itself an ambitious target of growing the installed power capacity to 6,765 megawatts in its first five-year term.

Out of that target, 1,600 megawatts was to come from geothermal sources, 1,920 megawatts from coal-powered plants and 420 megawatts from hydro.

Others were 650 megawatts from wind and 700 megawatts from the liquefied natural gas plant in Dongo Kundu, Mombasa.

The government has added slightly below 700 megawatts since 2014 when the installed capacity stood at f 2,094.9 megawatts. The current 2,711.7 megawatts reported by the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics was mainly achieved due to the addition of the 310 Lake Turkana Wind Power Projects and the 50-megawatt solar plant in Garissa, both commissioned in late 2018.