## KENYA TAPS THE EARTH’S HEAT

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**Canonical URL:** [KENYA TAPS THE EARTH’S HEAT](https://www.imf.org/-/media/files/publications/fandd/article/2022/december/kenya-taps-earth-heat.pdf)

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### Geothermal capacity and national strategy
- On a good day, about 95 percent of the national grid’s power comes from renewable sources, with anywhere from a third to half of that coming from geothermal wells.
- Kenya is the world’s seventh top producer of geothermal energy.
- The country of 53 million people lies in the Great Rift Valley, a series of trenches and lowland areas spanning 4,300 miles from Lebanon to Mozambique.
- Scientists estimate there will be a new ocean through the Rift Valley area in some 5 to 10 million years.
- The government has exploited close to 950 MW of geothermal energy so far, enough to power about 3,800,000 homes.
- Authorities and engineers state renewable energy accounted for close to 90 percent of power generation in Kenya.
- New president William Ruto has pledged to move to 100 percent clean energy by 2030.
- The government estimates there is 10,000 MW of untapped geothermal energy, enough to power Kenya’s current peak demand five times, spread out across two dozen sites in the Rift Valley region.
- Kenya already hosts the largest solar project in the region, the largest wind project on the continent, and is developing Olkaria VI, described as the largest geothermal plant on earth.

### Technical and cost characteristics
- Worldwide, engineers typically need to drill about 3,000 to 4,000 meters to make a geothermal well; some wells in Kenya are only 900 meters deep.
- It takes roughly K Sh 600 million ($5 million) to drill one well in the area around Hell’s Gate, with an average 5 megawatt (MW) potential.
- You need about 20 to 30 of those wells for a 140 MW power plant.
- Kenya’s cost-effective geothermal prospects stem from Rift Valley geology that provides shallower and more accessible heat resources.

### Economic and development implications
- Tobias Rasmussen, IMF resident representative in Kenya: “Renewable energy has the potential to be a major growth driver for Kenya going forward.”
- Henry Paul Batchi Baldeh, African Development Bank: “You have no emissions with geothermal. That enables Kenya to access cheap climate finance to pursue its own development agenda.”
- Geothermal expansion supports electrification and clean cooking alternatives, which can reduce deforestation and charcoal burning and improve women’s health and livelihoods.

### Regional and technical outreach
- Kenyan firms and engineers are exporting technology and expertise across the region, providing technical support for drilling in Ethiopia and Djibouti and surface studies in Rwanda and Comoros.

### Social and environmental challenges
- Indigenous populations and rights groups allege renewable energy projects are blighted by abuses and land grabs; residents around Hell’s Gate report officials and companies took advantage of illiteracy, isolation, and lack of colonial-era legal documents.
- Local testimony: a 40-something goat herder from Narasha claimed the land “was [ethnic] Maasai land. We didn’t get anything.”
- KenGen reported “good working relations” and that it built houses for those it resettled and provided local jobs; local residents dispute these claims, alleging qualified local graduates are not employed and jobs go to outsiders.
- Academics and conservationists have raised concerns about damage to the natural environment and wildlife around the Hell’s Gate site.
- The article concludes that Kenya has shown world leadership in geothermal energy but that KenGen and geothermal companies will need to work hard to include local communities equitably in their work.

*Finance & Development, December 2022 — “KENYA TAPS THE EARTH’S HEAT”*

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_Source: https://www.imf.org/-/media/files/publications/fandd/article/2022/december/kenya-taps-earth-heat.pdf_