The Menengai III geothermal power plant in Kenya is set to be commissioned in December this year. Renewable energy producer Sosian announced the plans and said the plant will have a capacity of 35 MWe.
Located in the Rift Valley in western Kenya, the State-owned Geothermal Development Company (GDC) conducted drilling of geothermal wells in the Menengai Crater in Nakuru starting 2011.
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Menengai Model
With a total of 43 wells and 24 wells tested so far, a total output of 165 MW has been confirmed in the Menengai field so far. The rest of the wells are yet to undergo testing. GDC also constructed the steam gathering system while a 132-kV substation has been constructed by Kenya Transmission Company (KETRACO) specifically for the three planned power plants.
This scheme, called the Menengai Model, has the GDC take the upfront risks of geothermal development. Private players were then invited to set up the power plants under build-own-operate contracts. In the case of Sosian Menengai, the IPP will be paying GC US $14.5M (Sh 1.7 billion per year for the next 25 years, after which ownership of the power plant will transfer to the government. The Zhejiang subsidiary Kaishan Compressor will also maintain the plant for 14 years.
“When electricity is finally generated at Menengai, our country will save more than Ksh 13bn (more than US $111M) per year in fuel tax and ultimately reduce the cost of electricity bills,” said John Lang’at, the regional director of GDC.
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