Home » Grappling in Darkness Despite Hosting Biggest Wind Power Project in Africa

Grappling in Darkness Despite Hosting Biggest Wind Power Project in Africa

By Dan Kaburu

The luxury of an uninterrupted power supply is often taken for granted by many, especially urban dwellers. Ironically, some residents living in counties that host Kenya’s supply remain the most underprivileged.

As the sun sets over Sarima Village in Loyangalani, Turkana County, the village is soon enveloped in darkness. The moonlight, though charming, fails to illuminate the area fully.

Ester Ng’emei sits outside with her two children, sharing a dinner of ugali and milk under the light of a solar lamp. They eat quickly, knowing the lamp will soon go out, leaving them in darkness and forcing them to sleep early.

Although their village hosts Africa’s largest wind power project, the Lake Turkana Wind Project (LTWP), it remains disconnected from the national grid. “Our problem is that we lack leadership. We have no one to speak for us to have us connected to the national grid,” Ng’emei laments.

Her daughter has been repeatedly sent home from school for failing to complete her homework, a consequence of the village’s lack of electricity.

Not too far from her house, inside Christine Enapal’s manyatta, her daughter does her homework using light from a phone. Enapal worries that the phone battery will soon die, leaving her daughter with unfinished homework.

She attributes the lack of electricity in the village to poor leadership and representation by local officials, many of whom she claims are poorly educated and incapable of lobbying for power connectivity.

“We have no one to fight for us as a community because our leaders are illiterate and cannot represent us well,” Enapal says.

During the day, the village endures an almost unbearable heat, especially for visitors. The locals, however, are no strangers to these extreme conditions. Hundreds of massive wind turbines spin steadily in the wind, generating electricity that feeds into Kenya’s national grid. They dominate the landscape, visible from every corner of the village and beyond. Despite living under these turbines, the village remains without power, depicting the irony of having a cow from which you cannot drink milk.

Locals say that the only thing they can smile about is a borehole that Lake Turkana Wind Power Project sunk for them. The borehole is powered using solar.

“We are grateful that we they dug this well for us, initially we used to go far to fetch water; However, when it comes to power connection, we have been forgotten. Power from our village lights up other places in Kenya, leaving us in darkness”. Said Agness Ngare, Sirima village resident.

Ilo Siki, says that the onset of the project, locals were assured that they will be the first beneficially of the power project. However, seven years after the completion of Lake Turkana Wind Project (LTWP), the community is yet to be connected to power. “We knew that our power needs will be a thing of the past, but that still remains a promise; however, we are grateful that a few of villagers though have been given some manual work in the company”, said Siki.

As you drive at night within the area, you will come across a fully lit station where officials from Lake Turkana Power Project live, a stark contrast to the surrounding darkness. Our efforts to speak to officials from LTWP bore no fruit.

Jacquiline Kimeu, Energy Coordinator at WWF-Kenya, says that to achieve Just energy transition, communities hosting national energy projects to be fully connected to the national grid or make access to other power sources such as solar more affordable.

“17 percent of Kenya’s electricity comes from Lake Turkana Wind Power Project in Loyangalani, but the community living around is in total darkness. That is against the principle of just power transition”, Said Kimeu.

Data from the  Ministry of Energy shows that as of June 2024, 9.65 million Kenyans were connected to electricity, a significant increase from 8.9 million in 2022.

Across Kenya, many villages like Sarima continue to live in darkness, despite the country’s capacity to generate power from various renewable sources.

Residents of Sarima will for now continue to see massive wind turbines dotting their villages spin steadily generating power and lighting other parts of the country, hoping that one day, darkness will be a thing of the past in their village.

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