Page 8 - AfrElec Week 29

AfrElec RENEWABLES AfrElec
Africa’s largest wind farm starts up in Kenya
KENYA
THE Lake Turkana Wind Power (LTWP) pro- ject has been brought online in Kenya as the country raises electricity generating capacity. e $775mn project is the largest wind farm in Africa, and forms part of Kenya’s goal to run on 100% renewable energy by 2020.
LTWP consists of 365 wind turbines on the eastern shores of Lake Turkana, each with a capacityof850kW,andahighvoltagesubstation that has been connected to the Kenyan national grid through an associated transmission line. e project has the capacity to add around 310 MW of power to the national grid, boosting Ken- ya’s electricity supply by around 13%. It is pow- ered by wind blowing in the Turkana Corridor, which has been dubbed “the windiest place on earth”. e low-level jet stream in the region orig- inates from the Indian Ocean and blows all year round, according to the Kenyan government.
“Today, we again raised the bar for the con- tinent as we unveil Africa’s single largest wind farm,” Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said at the project’s launch ceremony on July 19. “Kenya is without doubt on course to be a global leader in renewable energy.”
LTWP was developed by a consortium com- prising KP&P Africa, Aldwych International, the Investment Fund for Developing Countries, Vestas Eastern Africa, the Finnish Fund for Industrial Co-operation, KLP Norfund Invest- ments and Sandpiper. Financing came from a consortium of banks and other nancial institu- tions, including the African Development Bank (AfDB). e project is the largest private sector investment in Kenya’s history.
e country is making good progress on its goal of running on 100% green energy by next year. Currently, around 70% of Kenya’s installed electricity capacity comes from renewable energy sources, which is more than three times the global average. The country has invested heavily in geothermal power generation, with this accounting for 700 MW of generating capac- ity – the ninth largest in the world according to the Renewables 2018 Global Status Report.
Hydropower is also contributing signifi- cantly to the overall generation mix. State-owned power company KenGen produces around 80% of the electricity consumed in the country, with 65% of this coming from hydropower sources.
An estimated 9mn Kenyan households have access to o -grid renewable energy, according to the World Economic Forum, and this gure is forecast to rise further. And other wind projects are also under development in the country.
Elsewhere in Africa, wind farms are in opera- tion in Morocco, Ethiopia and South Africa. Two of Ethiopia’s wind farms account for 324 MW of the country’s total electricity production of 4,180 MW. South Africa, meanwhile, has added 645.71 MW to the national grid through the develop- ment of ve wind farms.
ere is still a long way to go, with the Inter- national Energy Agency (IEA) estimating that sub-Saharan Africa needs to invest $300bn in order to achieve universal electricity access by 2030. But the start-up of LTWP illustrates pro- gress being made, on both overall power gen- erating capacity and on increasing the share of renewables in the mix.™
LTWP consists of 365 wind turbines and a high voltage substation that has been connected to the Kenyan national grid through an associated transmission line.
The $775mn project is the largest wind farm in Africa, and forms part of Kenya’s goal to run on 100% renewable energy by 2020.
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w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m Week 29 24•July•2019