By Dawan Africa - Reporter
Garissa(Mogadishu24)-Power supply has partially resumed in Kenya after more than 16 hours of a nationwide blackout due to generation failures, confirmed by Kenya Power.
Each of the 47 counties in Kenya experienced a total unexpected blackout that lasted for extended hours, starting from Friday evening until Saturday afternoon.
Kenya Power company stated that the issue arose after a loss of 270MW generation from the Lake Turkana Wind Power plant, one of the hydro-electric power producers in the country.
“Last night, at 21:45, the country experienced a nationwide power outage after losing 270MW generation from the Lake Turkana Wind Power Plant (LTWP). The loss triggered an imbalance in the power system and tripped all other main generation units and stations, leading to a total outage on the grid,” read the statement from Kenya Power, the country’s sole power provider.
The power company reported that a team of highly skilled engineers is on-site to analyze the root cause of the trip that caused a cascade failure of the system.
“The system demand at the time was 1855.8MW, and therefore, a loss of approximately 15% of generation was expected to cause a widespread power outage,” the statement added.
The company also added that power has been restored to some regions in the country, using electricity from the Seven Forks Hydro Power stations, which was used for the restoration process.
“By 11:45 AM today, most of the transmission grid had been energized, and normal power supply to customers was restored as generation came to an end.”
However, many regions, including Nairobi, Coast, Western, and others, remain in darkness as power supply is still off.
Kenya Power stated that it is working jointly with Uganda to have electricity imports from the Uganda interconnector restored.
“Additionally, we are in the final stages of onboarding power from the Olkaria complex where most of the geothermal plants are located to allow the restoration of power supply to parts of Nairobi, Coast, Western, Central Rift, North Rift, and South Nyanza that are still without supply,” read the statement in parts.
Due to this failure, members of Parliament have summoned the Cabinet Secretary for Energy, Davis Chirchir, and the Kenya Power Chief Executive Officer Joseph Siror on Saturday evening.
Kenya Power serves as the only power provider in Kenya, with the right to distribute power to Kenyans.
Concerns have been raised by Kenyans over the monopoly held by Kenya Power and high electricity charges. However, the public’s plea has gone unanswered, as neither the government nor Kenya Power Company has made any changes to address these concerns.
Independent Power Producers (IPPs) submitted a petition to the parliament in June of this year to be allowed to directly provide power to customers and end the long-standing monopoly of Kenya Power.
With 50.1% government ownership and the remaining 49.9% owned by politicians, including the former President’s family, Kenya Power seems protected as the only power distribution company in Kenya.
