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Kenya Power said the outage affected entire country except the North Rift and Western regions.
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By Friday evening, the utility company reported that it had restored full supply in all the areas that were affected by the outage.
Image: ENERGY MIN/X
Most parts of the country suffered power outages on Friday morning.
Kenya Power said the outage affected entire country except the North Rift and Western regions.
By Friday evening, the utility company reported that it had restored full supply in all the areas that were affected by the outage.
In a seperate statement, Energy CS Opiyo Wandayi explained what caused the power outage.
According to Wandayi, a high-voltage power transmission line tripped at Suswa transmission substation.
"Today, Friday, September 6, 2024, at 8.56 am, the 220kV High Voltage Loiyangalani transmission line tripped at the Suswa substation while evacuating 288MW from the Lake Turkana Wind Power (LTWP) plant," Wandayi said in a statement.
He added that the trip was followed by a trip on the Ethiopia – Kenya 500kV DC interconnector that was then carrying 200MW, resulting to a total loss of 488MW.
"The total demand in the system at the time was 1790 MW. The loss of 488MW, accounting for 27.3 per cent of the total generation, resulted in cascade failure and partial collapse of the grid," Wandayi said.
The CS said the trip triggered power outage in the country except parts of Western Kenya which was supported by supply through the interconnector to Tororo, Uganda.
He said that restoration efforts commenced immediately and in earnest.
"As of 11.30 am this morning, the Ministry had normalised supply to parts of the North Rift, Central Rift, Nairobi and Mount Kenya regions," he said.
This included major towns and cities such as Nyeri, Embu, Kirinyaga, Nanyuki, Nakuru, Naivasha, Thika, Eldoret, Kericho, Kakamega, Siaya, Busia, Vihiga, Kisumu, Bungoma and Webuye.
Kenya Power apologised for any inconvenience caused to clients.
The outage comes just days after another outage hit several parts of the country.
The Friday night blackout affected various parts of the country except the North Rift region and sections of the Western region.
Wandayi said the ministry is looking into short-term and long-term interventions to address the challenge which include bringing on board the private sector to supplement government efforts.
To achieve this, the CS said the ministry is pursuing the lifting of the moratorium on Power Purchase Agreements imposed by the National Assembly.
He added that the ministry will fast-track the implementation of baseload (hydro, geothermal) generation projects to improve energy security and provide adequate spinning reserves.
Wandayi added that the government will enhance grid flexibility and resilience by completing several projects.
The projects are Turkwell-Ortum-Kitale; Sondu-Ndhiwa; Nanyuki-Isiolo; Narok – Bomet; Mariakani substation, repair of Loiyangalani – Suswa Transmission line for double circuit operation and migration from 220kV to 400kV operation; completion of ground electrode for HVDC for bipolar operation; Lessos substation and installation of STATCOM for voltage regulation at Suswa and Rabai.
The CS added that the government will also fast-track construction of alternative evacuation lines.