Editor's Review

  • The report reveals that Nairobi West consumes the highest electricity than most parts of the country. 
  • The current national power outage is about two hours per month. 

A new report from Kenya Power has highlighted Nairobi estates that suffer from significant power outages.

According to the report, Nairobi North estates are the most hit with power blackouts ranging between six and three hours per month, higher than the countrywide range of two to four hours per month.

The region comprises estates such as Roysambu, Runda, Githunguri, Baba Dogo, and Kiambu.

The report adds that power interruptions in Nairobi West households which happen to be the highest consumers experienced the least outages with blackouts lasting as low as under two hours a month and have never gone beyond four hours since 2016.

Nairobi West region comprises estates like Lang’ata, Ngong road, Kilimani, Hurlingham, and South C. Notably, these households consume more electricity than entire western Kenya, North Rift, and Mount Kenya combined.

A 2017 study on electricity reliability in Kenya found that Kenya Power was losing more than Sh2 billion per year from power outages.

The study by the University of Massachusetts said most outages were caused by faults with just a few being planned by Kenya Power.

“Though planned outages only account for 0.5 percent of total incidences, they account for 5.6 percent of total revenue loss. Limiting the number of planned outages by grouping together maintenance activities whenever possible can help to alleviate some of this revenue loss,” recommended the 2016 study on Kenya’s grid.