Gov’t moves to calm fears after President Ruto’s power rationing remarks

The government has moved to calm fears of looming power rationing, following remarks by President William Ruto suggesting that between 5pm and 10pm, the State has been forced to cut power in some areas to keep the grid stable.

Principal Secretary for Energy Alex Wachira now says that Kenya has a sufficient supply of energy, and that the President is only calling for increased generation to hasten industrialisation.

The story began in Doha, Qatar, when President Ruto attended the Second World Summit for Social Development. While addressing a section of Kenyans, the President made remarks indicating that the government has been shutting off power supply in some parts of the country between 5pm and 10pm, to keep the national grid stable.

When the news reached the country, Kenyans expressed fears over possible blackouts in the future.

“Yes, it is true that once in a while because of breakdowns and because of the intermittent nature of solar or wind we can have a slight constraint. But over and above, we do have adequate power within the country but the reserves are normally very thin,” Kenya Power MD and CEO Dr. Eng. Joseph Siror has said.

PS Wachira, on his part, said: “We don’t have a spinning reserve, what is a spinning reserve? Spinning reserve is, in case we have a plant that is put in case today Lake Turkana has low output, we do not have a plant that can be able to inject instantly, to ensure that we do not load shed. So we survive very well on days when we have good wind output, but on days when we have bad wind output in the country we do not have enough firm capacity that can power our peak power demand.”

Since 2018, no new energy sources have been added to the national grid, due to a Power Purchase Agreement moratorium imposed by Parliament.

The moratorium was introduced as part of an effort to investigate the cost of power. And in the seven years since, energy consumption has nearly outpaced generation.

“We need to start acting and acting fast, the issue of providing a moratorium that blocks any new development, and we are sitting pretty under the perception that there is too much power in Kenya is a misnomer and it really needs to be addressed,” said Dr. Eng. Siror.

“We need to increase, we need to look at LNG, we need to look at nuclear power plants, we need to look at high grand falls dams so that we can be able to industrialise as a country,” PS Wachira added.

The push for new generation capacity is seen as crucial as Kenya continues to court global investors around the world to set up shop in the country.

Dr. Eng. Siror noted: “In terms of attracting the investors, it is very good for me to state that during the day we have adequate generation and it's only that window between 6pm to 10pm which we are addressing and I think the PS has addressed that, but again after 10pm we have too much power available.”

At the same time, Kenya Power is investing over Ksh.29 billion into the grid to enhance redundancy and stability of the grid.

After days of panic following the President’s pronouncements around power rationing, the government is now actively moving to reassure Kenyans that there will be no blackouts caused by power rationing, saying the Head of State’s comments were meant to encourage power generation.