Electricity customers in Kenya experienced an average of 10.14 hours without power every month in the financial year ended June 2024, according to the regulator.
- The Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (EPRA) reported that compared to the financial year ended June 2023, when outages per month averaged 8.37 hours, unplanned system interruptions increased by 21%.
- April 2024 registered the highest incidences of blackouts as customers experienced 17.29 hours without power, the lowest being July 2023 when outages averaged 5.5 hours.
- All the months in the financial year ended 2024 experienced outages surpassing the EPRA limit of 5 hours at average as stipulated in the 2023/2024 tariff control period.
“The SAIDI for the period under review averaged 10.14 hours per month. This is an increase from the 8.37 hours per customer recorded in the year ended June 2023. This exceeded the EPRA target of 5.00 hours per customer stipulated in the 2023/2024 tariff control period,” EPRA said.
Comparatively, planned power interruptions for customers averaged 2.53 hours per month in the period under review. This was commendably lower than EPRA’s target of 3.53 hours for planned power interruptions.
The longest planned power interruption was in April 2024 where sustained interruptions lasted for 3.4 hours. The shortest average interruption duration for customers was in July 2023 when it was at 2 hours.
Kenya Power also reportedly lost 23.47% of power they purchased all through the period under review. This was above EPRA’s benchmark limit of no more than 18.5% of system losses.
“System losses encompass the electrical energy lost during transmission and distribution, comprising both technical losses and commercial losses. The financial losses arising from the difference between the allowed benchmark losses and actual losses are absorbed by the utility,” EPRA explained.
Electricity demand during peak hours (7:30pm to 8:30pm) for the year under review stood at 2,177.13 MW. This was a slight improvement from the 2,149 MW needed during peak hours in the previous year.
“Monthly peak demands in the second half of the period under review were consistently above 2,170MW with the exception of the month of January 2024,” the regulator added.
Electricity generation rose slightly by 2.98% in 2023/2024. In March this year, the highest amount of electricity was generated at 1,180 MW, with the lowest generation being in February this year and December 2023 when only 1,110 was generated.
The power grid still largely depends on Geothermal sources accounting for 26.37%, followed closely by Hydro-Electric Power with 24.38%. Others included Thermal Power (17.78%), Solar (12.38%), and Wind Power (12.19%).
In the year under review, industrial and commercial enterprises still utilized a big chunk of electricity generated by the grid representing 51.86%. Domestic users spent 30.76% of electricity, while SMEs used 16.38%. Despite the rising popularity of electric mobility, EVs only used 1.26 GWh in the reviewed year.
