After a challenging year of traveling restrictions, social distancing and extraordinary HSE measures, Kipeto Energy’s wind generation facility was this week formally certified as ready to connect to the Kenya national grid and will hopefully soon be allowed to start commissioning and commercial operations. 

In order to reach this point the  teams involved worked in an extremely focussed and coordinated manner to finish construction, installation and testing to the most detailed level. The effort was coordinated by the Worley team who represents Kipeto as the “Owner’s Engineer” and the site activities were performed by CMEC as the EPC contractor, who executed diligently on every aspect.  The GE renewables team provided dedicated support to ensure the 60 1.7MW turbines are all 100% primed to start generating electricity. Meanwhile a team from MottMcDonalds witnessed every step of the process and reviewed hundreds of documents in their role as Independent Engineer to confirm the overall plant readiness.

These final steps towards readiness, completed over the last 6 weeks, included the following:

• Correction of 409 equipment or workmanship deviations and non-conformances, ensuring safety and quality of the installation 
• Final submission of 1343 design documents and drawings.
• 654 Test sheets were signed off, representing more than 5000 electrical/electronic tests and checks done and witnessed for confirmation.
• For each of the 60 Wind Turbines alone 174 tests and checks were performed, a whopping 10,440 in total.

Kipeto is continuing to work closely with KPLC to obtain a date for connecting to the grid and start delivering some affordable renewable energy to the Kenyan people.