Kenya imports energy in the form of oil and oil products. Most of this oil is used for transport but some is used for domestic and industrial purposes such as water pumping, home lighting, cooking and electricity generation.
Oil use adds the harmful carbon dioxide emissions to the air causing a change in the world climates.
Experts across the world concur that it is desirable to reduce the output of carbon dioxide, which comes from burning the fossil fuels oil and coal.
The only way to do this is to develop the renewable energy sources: wind, sun, tidal and hydro.
Luckily Kenya is on the path to a complete turn around. Stakeholders are in an aggressive path to curb further environmental degradation by adopting generation and use renewable energy.
Prime Minister Raila Odinga last week appointed a National taskforce on accelerated development of green energy.
Expected to submit report by end of August this year, the taskforce is mandated to outline how too significantly reduce cost of energy and install additional power generation capacity of 2000MW by June 2012.
Key targets include modalities to construct and commission accelerated Green Energy program through geothermal power plants, wind and solar power projects, bio fuel, carbon free power facilities by large power users.
It will also focus on biomass, solid waste and other recycled power generation facilities.
It will also recommend a package on plants to produce energy saving bulbs and other devices and conversion from conventional energy sources to energy saving ones by public institutions, homes and private enterprises.
Task force
“The taskforce shall identify and recommend a package that will assist with mobilization of technical and financial resources for the implementation of green energy programmes and projects, including public private partnerships,” the gazette reads in part.
Solar energy generation has been on the rise in the past few years and the Government’s step to set up solid mechanisms to change Kenya’s over reliance on non-renewable is timely.
With Kenya located on the equator, argue experts, solar energy devices are cheap to produce. It is also easy to use and require little maintenance.
It is only during the rainy season (mainly March to September) that there may not always be enough sunlight to operate solar devices but generally, sun shines across the year in most parts of the country.
A majority of Kenyans in rural areas are yet to access electricity hence solar energy can be of help.
Last year, the government launched a blue print for promoting Kenya’s renewable energy with a strategy to also conserve non-renewable energy sources.
Launched by a group of parastatals the Kenya Energy Sector Environment Program (KEEP) aims to promote efficient energy use and environmental conservation.
Kenya’s high cost of kerosene has forced the poor to rely on charcoal, leading to deforestation in water catchments like Mau forest, Cherangani Hills and Aberdare ranges.
Currently more than 1,000 hectares of forest cover in Mau has been destroyed causing the ongoing hue and cry. The annual revenue loss from such destruction runs into tens of billions of shillings.
Forests
Recently, the Prime Minister, Raila Odinga said that the nation’s water catchment areas will be preserved despite the population pressure that is threatening to terminate them.
About 82 percent of urban households use charcoal, while wood fuel is the main source of energy in rural areas.
The charcoal industry employs more than 200,000 people and contributes over 32 billion shillings to the economy annually.
KenGen Managing Director, Eddy Njoroge, said the company would shift power generation from diesel to geothermal and hydropower. He says about 85 percent of the planned new capacity will come from clean geothermal and hydro renewable sources.
Sources of renewable Energy
There is a thermal power station at the Coast. The fuel for the thermal stations and some industrial processes should be replaced by renewable energy sources.
Potential
Kenya has four main sources of renewable energy including hydroelectric power, mainly on the Tana River; Biomass in the form of biogas and alcohol from agricultural by-products; Wind Power from the Kano Plains convection system in Nyanza Province and Solar Energy, especially in the cloud-free arid zone of northern Kenya.
Experts also see Coast area as a potential ground to reap wind energy.
According to a paper by one E.G. Matthews of Wimborne Energy Consultancy geothermal power generation of the Rift Valley has potential since its among the few sources of energy not derived from solar energy.
Biomass
Biomass, he argues, in the form of alcohol to be added to motor fuel as gasohol is growing and there is considerable potential for biogas, as yet unutilised.
“Solar power for electricity needs technological improvement in the equipment needed to convert sunlight to electricity, though solar water heating ought to be built into every new building. However, solar conversion of sunlight might well make Kenya a major supplier of energy in the future, probably in the form of hydrogen to replace oil products for transport,” he asserts.
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