Raw materials
Kenya to ban new solar, wind power producers without backup systems
Tuesday December 5, 2023
Lawyer Julius Migos Ogamba (right), chairman of Kenya Electricity Generating Company PLC (KenGen), and Alex Wachira, principal secretary of the State Department of Energy, speak to journalists after attending the 71st assembly KenGen Annual General Meeting at the Eka Hotel in Nairobi, November 30, 2023. PHOTO | LUCY WANJIRU | NMG
New wind and solar power producers will have to install battery storage systems before being allowed to feed into the national grid under the latest plan to tackle frequent outages.
The Ministry of Energy said it is about to implement the policy to block energy producers of the two categories who do not have the Battery Energy Storage System (Bess) as a solution rescue.
This comes at a time when the Kenya Electricity Generating Company (KenGen) has announced plans to implement a 100 megawatt Bess project in 2024 as the implementing agent for the World Bank-funded project.
“This is aimed at reducing intermittency, storing energy and using it for peaks, reducing the discharge of our steam at Olkaria, especially at night, because you can continue to produce, store that energy and transmit to the grid during peak hours and daytime,” said Energy PS Alex Wachira.
The Cabinet has already passed the resolution asking KenGen to implement the project and the ministry says the progress is at different stages.
“KenGen will implement the former, but we are exploring PPPs to implement more battery energy storage in the future. We have several Bess storages phased between now and 2032.
“In the future, any variable renewable energy producer we integrate should be able to benefit from battery support to ensure grid stability. This is a policy that the ministry wants to implement and ensure that in the future, any power plant that we integrate, whether wind or solar, must have battery energy storage to guarantee the stability of the network,” Mr. Wachira said.
KenGen said it was working with the World Bank to accelerate the 100-megawatt Bess project to address increasing power outages seen in the recent past.
KenGen chief executive Peter Njenga said the battery storage system would support not only wind and solar plants, but also geothermal plants that lose power at night when their usage is low.
“We have challenges in the grid because of the intermittency of wind and solar and that is going to play a critical role and even support excess generations in geothermal,” he said.
