NAIROBI, Kenya, Nov 10 – In a bid to ensure the effective distribution of power in both urban and rural areas within the East Africa region, governments have been urged to embrace new testing and maintenance technology.
This call was made during an energy stakeholder’s forum in Nairobi, where players from Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Ethiopia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo held discussions on how to better carry out assessments of both medium voltage and high voltage networks.
“The push is really to ensure that consumers have access to quality energy at affordable cost. We believe that by bringing down the final cost of the consumer through different strategies, whether it’s from government intervention in terms of policy, operations, and maintenance, and basically ensuring that the power that comes to you and me and also for industrial customers comes at an affordable cost and is reliable,” says Machacha Muchiri, Managing Director,Amotech Africa.
Stakeholders in the energy sector have also called for policies that will spur the uptake of renewable energy in the country.
Speaking during the energy utility forum in Nairobi, stakeholders noted a need to address challenges such as financing and regulations to ensure reliable and quality power for the masses.
Currently, Kenya generates more than 75% of its electricity from renewable sources primarily geothermal power and hydropower. German firm Megger and Amotech Africa organized the forum.
According to Daniel Salathe,Mananging Director, Megger Africa, “There is a wide variety of electric power socket outlets in the house. The variety of electrical testing ensures that you have a stable and reliable network and all manufacturers have to test and measure equipment for that entire range and electricity management is well protected for better energy usage.”
Locally, Amotech is in a working partnership with key players in the energy sector in Eastern Africa such as Kenya Electricity Transmission Company Limited (KETRACO), Kenya Power & Lightning Company, KenGen, UMEME, Rwanda Energy Group, Uganda Electricity Transmission Company Ltd (UETCL), and Uganda Electricity Generation Company Ltd (UEGCL).
Muchiri added , “The main goal of all these partnerships is to provide premium test and measurement solutions for their day-to-day maintenance activities which involve maintaining reliable assets in a safe test environment.”
One of the challenges facing the transmission and distribution sector is the need to deliver reliable and cost-effective electricity. Regular testing of assets can guarantee the quality of components installed in the network and contribute to power system reliability, representing a fundamental step in reducing the probability of disturbances and outages.
Eng. David Mutitu, Acting. General Manager, System Operations and Power Management at KETRACO, reiterated that the demand for cabling has increased over the years in Kenya and the larger East Africa region and this has increased the demand for innovative technologies that focus on the maintenance and repair of cables.
With the main focus of the seminar being medium and high voltage testing such power protection, transformer testing, cable testing, fault location, partial discharge, and grid analytics, the main objective of the training stress on the importance of cable condition assessment in ensuring optimal performance by protecting cables from failure.
The delegates had the opportunity to visit Isinya Substation -Kajiado country.
Where they learned about different testing and measurement techniques.
“Today we have to learn about the need to evaluate and locate partial discharge (PD) faults in the cable insulation and accessories of all types of high-voltage power cables. PD activity is an indication of incipient faults in the insulation and is therefore widely regarded as one of the best ‘early warning’ indicators of the deterioration of medium and high-volt-age insulation,” says Christine Mauka, the Manager in charge of the Isinya Substation.
