Nigeria’s Power drops as Kenya gets Sh42b Power Boost from World Bank –

NAIROBI: Over 630,000 more Kenyans will have access to electricity while existing consumers will enjoy better quality of electricity services following approval of $457.5 million (Sh42.14 billion) financial package by World Bank Group The Kenya Electricity Modernisation Project package includes an International Development Association (IDA) credit of $250 million, an IDA guarantee of $200 million and a $7.5 million grant from the Strategic Climate Fund-Scaling up Renewable Energy Programme. 

 

The IDA guarantee will enhance Kenya Power’s credit quality and enable it to raise about $500 million of new commercial debt with lower interest rates and longer tenors to replace existing debt that is placing a heavy burden on the company.

“We are making this significant and innovative investment in Kenya’s power sector to expand electricity access to low income households and small businesses as part of the push for shared prosperity,” World Bank Country Director for Kenya Diarietou Gaye said.

Updated Thursday, April 2nd 2015 at 00:00 GMT +3 Share this story: NAIROBI: Over 630,000 more Kenyans will have access to electricity while existing consumers will enjoy better quality of electricity services following approval of $457.5 million (Sh42.14 billion) financial package by World Bank Group The Kenya Electricity Modernisation Project package includes an International Development Association (IDA) credit of $250 million, an IDA guarantee of $200 million and a $7.5 million grant from the Strategic Climate Fund-Scaling up Renewable Energy Programme.

The IDA guarantee will enhance Kenya Power’s credit quality and enable it to raise about $500 million of new commercial debt with lower interest rates and longer tenors to replace existing debt that is placing a heavy burden on the company.

SHARED PROSPERITY “We are making this significant and innovative investment in Kenya’s power sector to expand electricity access to low income households and small businesses as part of the push for shared prosperity,” World Bank Country Director for Kenya Diarietou Gaye said.

“Modern, reliable electricity will improve the quality of life of Kenyans and underpins enhanced competitiveness of the Kenyan economy,” she said. The IDA credit and the grant, will be used by the Government, Kenya Power and the Rural Electrification Authority to finance infrastructure investments, and also to support technical assistance and training activities of Kenya Power, REA, the Energy Regulatory Commission and the Ministry of Energy.

The IDA Guarantee will allow Kenya Power to significantly reduce its financing costs, improve liquidity and continue investing in improving the quality of its services. However, power supply from the national grid has again slumped below the 3,000-megawatts mark to 2,988.72MW on the back of gas shortfall and lower water supply to the nation’s thermal and hydropower plants respectively.

Gas-fired power plants generate about 70 per cent of the nation’s electricity, while the balance is derived from hydro power plants, including the Kainji and Jebba power stations, which have a combined installed capacity of 1,330MW. The downturn in power generation has exacerbated outages and load-shedding being experienced in many parts of the country, and reversed the recent slight improvement seen after supply fell to 2,767.45MW exactly one month ago.

Electricity supply fell to 2,988.72MW on April 12, while 3,060.37MW was generated that day, according to data obtained from the Federal Ministry of Power on Monday. Power generation had on March 11 dropped to 2,747.45MW, while 2,676.64MW was sent out to consumers, down from 3,505MW on March 8.