Ethiopia’s State-owned power producer and distributor, Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP), is now among the largest electricity suppliers to Kenya, which increased imports from its northern neighbour to plug deficits from local producers.
The Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (Epra) last week said the market share for imports, a large chunk of which comes from Ethiopia, has grown to account for 10.48 per cent of all the power that was consumed in Kenya over the six months to December.
Kenya imports power from Ethiopia and Uganda to meet demand whenever power production from local producers is not adequate to cope with demand.
Kenya has traditionally imported power from Uganda to meet demand, particularly in Western Kenya, which has not been adequately served by major power sources such as geothermal from Olkaria owing to weak transmission capacity to the region.