ISIS Report 19/10/09
Kenya to Build Africa’s Largest Windfarm
Ambitious
plans to light up Africa, but local off grid power sources must not be
neglected Sam Burcher
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 A clean
energy frontier
The desert
land around the beautiful Lake Turkana in Kenya, the scene of an award winning
film [1] (see The
Constant Gardener SiS 30) is set to become the site
of Africa’s largest windfarm by 2012. This ambitious project aims to end Africa’s electrical blackouts and tackle global warming simultaneously [2].
The Lake Turkana Wind Project (LTWP) has received funds of 300
million euros from the African Development Bank, 70
percent of the total cost, the remainder will come from private Dutch and Kenyan investors.
The project will produce 310 megawatts (MW) of power going directly to the national
grid. It is hoped that this will meet the surging demand for energy though
renewable resources.
The African Development Bank is a treaty signed in 1963 [3] which
focuses on regional development and is active in 78 countries throughout the
Continent. Its aims are to:
·
Make loans and equity investments for the social
and economic advancement of regional member countries
·
Provide technical assistance for the preparation
and execution of development projects and programs
·
Promote investments of public and private
capital for developing purposes
·
Assist in co-ordinating national and
multinational projects and programs that promote regional integration.
The LTWP consists of 365 wind turbines at a height of 30-40 metres
each with a capacity of 850 kilowatts (KW). This will add approximately 25 percent to Kenya’s existing electricity capacity,
which is projected to produce 1 440 Gigawatt hours (GWh) of power per year,
enough to light up around 2 million Kenyan households [4].
Currently, less that one in five Kenyan has access to electricity
and almost three quarters of its major power supplier’s KenGen’s electricity comes
from hydropower. Some 11 percent of this energy
is powered by geothermal plants that absorb heat and steam from rocks deep
below the Rift Valley. But low rainfall in the country has boosted the short
term reliance on fossil fuels such as coal. However, as only 10 percent of Kenya’s total energy comes from
electricity (see Table 1), this project is a
significant step towards Kenya’s 2030 Vision of Development and Least Cost
Power Development Plan (2009-2029).
Africa going for the wind
Kenya is not the only African country harnessing energy from the wind. The
Tigray region of neighbouring Ethiopia, which has already produced remarkable crop
yields from compost [5] (see The
Tigray Project, SiS 23), has recently commissioned a £190 million 120 MW wind farm. This will represent 15
percent of Ethiopia’s current electrical capacity and more windfarms are planned.
In Tanzania, 100 MW of power will be produced from two projects in the Central Singida region, which account for more than 10 percent of the current supply.
Earlier this year, South Africa became the first
African country to announce a feed in tariff for wind power, which means that customers
generating electricity receive a financial remuneration for selling power to
the national grid.
Two further wind projects are underway in Kenya. One is in the popular tourist town Naivasha and one is in the Ngong Hills near Nairobi where Danish wind company Vestas have already installed six 50-metre
V52 turbines contributing 5.1 megawatts to the national grid. It is believed
that 365 V52 turbines will be used in the LTWP.
The
Turkana Channel Jet Stream
The LTWP will
be constructed at a rate of one turbine per day starting from July 2011 to be
completed by July 2012. The wind park will take advantage of the low level jet
stream called the Turkana Channel Jet that blows all year round and is at full
force during the night. The average monthly wind speed at the site, on the
southeast side of Lake Turkana measures 11 metres per second (at a height of
between 40 and 80 metres) one of the highest averages recorded globally.
The
windpark will cover 40m2 and turbines
will span three ridges 70 metres apart between 450
metres at the lake shore and the bases of Mount Kulal (2 300 masl)) and the Mount Nyiru range (2 750 masl).
This is a strategy to catch the SE winds blowing through the Rift Valley in
between the East African and the Ethiopian Highlands.
What are
carbon credits?
Carbon Africa
is a carbon credit trading company in Kenya that has emerged in tandem with the
LTWP. A carbon credit is a permit approved by a body of the United Nations
(UN) known as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), an arrangement under Article
12 of the Kyoto Protocol. This permit allows the holder to emit one metric
tonne of carbon dioxide or carbon dioxide equivalent per one carbon credit.
Carbon credits are awarded to countries, or entities, that reduce
their greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) to below a set baseline. It is expected
that the LTWP will generate somewhere between 565 920 – 1 264 320 GHG emission
reductions per year. Therefore, an average of 850 000
tonnes of CO2 equivalent electricity generated
from wind priced at 10 euros per carbon credit would accrue 8 500 000 euros per
year. An independent Gold Standard review, which is an independent carbon
credit certification body, will monitor the sustainable benefits of the LTWP.
Development
pros and cons
An environmental and social impact assessment (ESIA) of the
LTWP has been done [6].
The report concludes that there will be a number of social, economic and
environmental impacts both positive and negative for local communities and for
the region in general. For example, 196 km of new tarmac roads must be built
to transport the 8 ton axle weight of each wind turbine mast and blade from Mombasa to the Lioyangalani location. There will also be the significant reconstruction of
existing roads and the construction of a 266 km
transmission line to junction electricity via multiple towns in the region to
connect to a terminal substation for grid feed-in.
Currently, all the local institutions such as schools, hospitals,
missionary stations and tourist facilities are powered by diesel. The
Lioyangalani district is very poor, has a low nutrition rate and is dependent
on food relief. Therefore, there are obvious benefits for health, education,
local employment, and the stabilization of electricity supplies as well as the
diversification of power sources.
As the bulk of Kenya’s energy derives from wood fuel and other
biomass resources (see Table 1) the result has been the highest deforestation
rates in Africa.
|
Table 1
Energy use in Kenya [6]
|
Energy
source
|
Percentage of total energy
|
|
Wood/Biomass
|
68
|
|
Petroleum
|
22
|
|
Electricity
|
9
|
|
Other
sources
|
1
|
|
On the negative side, a predicted 600 people working in the area at the
peak of construction will increase the exploitation of natural resources,
noise, vibration, pollution and risk of disease from outsiders coming in. It
will also increase disease vectors from stagnant waters in pits, ponds and quarries.
There will be disturbance to livestock, loss of trees, shrubs and grasses, and
increased soil erosion from digging and turbine installation. There are further
concerns for environmental impact on birds, fish and wildlife, (see Box.)
The indigenous population around Lake Turkana include four major
Kenyan tribes people; the Samburu, the Turkana, the El Molo and the Rendile.
According to the ESIA, they will benefit directly from cold storage for fish
caught on the lake and many problems including ‘relief dependency syndrome’
will be solved. The EISA’s table of environmental perametres has predictably
placed the stabilization of electricity at the top as highly positive and the
risk of bird mortality at the bottom as moderately negative. The risk to
collision between birds and turbine blades is thought to be low.
The
beasts, birds and fishes of Lake Turkana
Lake Turkana
is in the Great Rift Valley, 400 km from Nairobi [7]. It is a saline body of
water that originally flowed into the Nile, but was cut off millions of years
ago. It is the 20th largest lake in the world and home to at least
84 species of birds, native to Kenya. Birds such as common and wood sandpipers,
African skimmers, little stints, white necked cormorants, the greater flamingo
and Heulins Bustard flock there. It is a key stopover site for birds on
migration passage for breeding, feeding and nesting that are supported by
plankton masses in the lake.
Fish such as the African perch, tilapia and African tetra are
abundant in Lake Turkana. It is also home to Africa’s largest population of Nile crocodiles. Whilst animals such as kudu, oryx, zebra, gazelle, giraffe and buffalo
outside of the Marabit National Park and other national parks in the region
have been hunted to extinction, reptiles such as adder cobra, lizard viper and
scorpion thrive.
The once abundant acacia tree has been exploited for firewood and
for income generation from charcoal. Other plants in the locality are
traditionally used for medicinal purposes are also eaten by the grazing herds
belonging to local tribes peoples, who are mainly pastoralists.
|
Local power development
It must be
remembered that no more than 20% of Africans have access to electricity, in
some areas as few as 5%, dropping to 2% in rural regions [8]. Dr Bhattacharyya
from Dundee University is leading a research project into energy for
less-industrialised countries. He has warned that inefficient energy technologies
used by low-income families in Africa such as burning wood and other biomass
such as dung, crop wastes, kersosene and candles is bad for the environment and
for human health, and recommends the development of local ideas.
He
said, “Just extending the grid does not help the poor as they always lose out
when there are shortages. What they need is local power.” Therefore, off grid
local and small-scale reliable power sources such as the innovative windmill
made entirely from scrap materials by a boy in Malawi [9] (see Harnessing the Wind with
Scrap SiS 44) must be encouraged. Low or no cost strategies such as
scrap turbines help communities to power their homes and schools, to irrigate
crops and to lower carbon emissions throughout the Continent.
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