The Kenyan government has planned to construct three power plants to exploit steam in the Rift Valley, the Geothermal Development Company (GDC) has revealed
The GDC said it will drill 120 wells in the first stage of the project, with the three plants expected to generate 300MW of power by 2018.
“A period of 24-36 months will be provided for power plant construction,” read a statement from the company.
Suitable investors for the project will be expected to bring in a total of US$400mn for the development, however the Kenyan government would not promise risk guarantees.
It encouraged potential investors to find funding from organisations such as the World Bank’s Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency.
Kenya currently has 1,664MW of capacity, while there is a demand of about 1,410MW which is still rising.
The government recently said it wanted to add 5,000MW to Kenya’s power output by 2017 to drive economic growth even quicker, which is set to increase power demand to 15,000MW by 2030.
It also said that it aims to cut the cost of power generation by 50 per cent in three to four years, primarily by replacing diesel generation.
