HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept
{
"id": 206413,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/206413/?format=api",
"text_counter": 137,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Prof. Olweny",
"speaker_title": "",
"speaker": {
"id": 122,
"legal_name": "Patrick Ayiecho Olweny",
"slug": "patrick-olweny"
},
"content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I beg to move the following Motion:- THAT, in view of the fact that the sugar mills in this country have the capacity to co-generate electricity in excess of their requirements, and that the excess energy generated is currently going to waste; aware that the country also produces excess alcohol from molasses which can be blended with petroleum to produce gasohol; this House grants leave to introduce a Bill to amend the Energy Act to allow the mills to sell the excessive electricity they generate to the national grid or directly to other consumers and also to allow the use of alcohol from molasses to produce gasohol. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the aim of this Motion is to make changes in our legislation. It is also to give adequate and sufficient room for Kenya to pay attention to renewable energy that we produce from our resources such as materials from the sugar mills. Co-generation which is one of the issues here, is a process by which we will efficiently produce electric power and use geothermal energy by optimum utilisation of biomas materials and schemes. That is what we would get from the mills by use of bagasse, which is one of the products of the sugar factories. As I said, bagasse is the surplus material that we get from sugar. If we were to use it in co-generation, it would mean that factories would burn it, generate electricity out of it and also steam. Why co-generation in Kenya? Kenya is one country which has a lot of deficit in electricity. We are a country that is electric power deficient. Kenya has installed a capacity of 1,155 megawatts. That is the installed capacity in this country, but we only produce 1,067 for use in this country. Virtually our country is in darkness. At night, it is basically dark. Only 15 per cent of the Kenyan population has access to electric power. If you compare this to other developing countries, particularly in Africa, you will find that they have an average of 32 per cent of their population having access to electric power. For example, South Africa has 67 per cent of its population having access to electric power. Ghana has 45 per cent of its population accessing electricity. Zambia has 42 per cent of its population accessing power while Egypt and Tunisia have 90 per cent of their population accessing electric power. Ours is only 15 per cent. That means that we have a long way to go to give electric power to our people. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, Kenya's electricity is also very expensive compared to other countries because it costs 8 cents per kilowatt hour. In Uganda, it costs 4 cents per kilowatt hour. In Malawi it costs 2.5 cents per kilowatt hour. In Egypt it is 2.8 cents while in Zambia it costs 2.3 cents. So, Kenya has to do something. If there are other sources of generating electric power, we need to take advantage of that. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, if you look at the power sources in Kenya today, you will find that we have the hydro-based power source, where electricity is generated from dams and turbines that are constructed. About 57 per cent of our electricity comes from that source. There is geo-thermal electricity which constitutes about 9.8 per cent of the electricity that is consumed in this country. We also have fossil fuel power source. When fossilised energy sources are burnt, they give us 32 per cent of our fuel consumption and others constitute just 0.7 per cent. Kenya has a lot of potential for co-generation. If we take advantage of the biomass materials that we have in this country, we would produce a lot of electricity. This would be added to the other sources of power that we already have. In this country, we have 1,700,000 tonnes of August 29, 2007 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 3545 bagasse which is produced by our sugar mills. This can be turned into electricity. Unfortunately, only 35 per cent of that is used for co-generation in this country. That means that over 1 million tonnes of bagasse is going to waste. It is not being used for power production. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, in other words, if we had to use all the bagasse that is produced in this country by our sugar mills, we would produce an additional 77.4 megawatts of power, which would be added to the national grid. It is only Mumias Sugar Factory that produces some electricity from its bagasse. It produces a total of 12 megawatts out of its bagasse and sells only four megawatts to the national grid. The other mills also have a lot of potential for electricity production. If all the bagasse in Mumias was to be used for electricity production, we would get 50 megawatts from Mumias. The other mills would also give us a lot of power. Chemelil, Sony, Nzoia and West Kenya Sugar factories would give us 15 megawatts each at the moment. They are now expanding their mills and they would produce more than double the current estimated capacity. In fact, West Kenya Sugar Company would give us over ten times its current estimated power capacity after the expansion which is being carried out now. Muhoroni, as it is today, would give us 7.6 megawatts and Miwani Sugar Factory, if it was running at its capacity, would give us 6.2 megawatts of electricity. This means that Kenya has a lot of potential for producing electricity from the renewable energy source if only we could have legislation to allow them to produce electricity and sell it. We also have other sources of materials that we could use to co-generate electricity. We can co-generate electricity from coffee factories. The coffee husks can be used to co-generate electricity. Rice and sawmills are other sources from which electricity can be generated. If we were to do this, how would this country benefit? Right now, we are importing some electricity from Uganda. We would save on the foreign exchange. We do not have enough electricity, as I have said, and we would reduce the deficit. The piles of bagasse that are heaped around the factories are a health hazard, in that, they can catch fire any time. Recently, Chemelil Sugar Factory almost went on fire when the bagasse that was heaped around it caught fire and it was quite difficult for the management to put it off. There can also be co-generation of power using bagasse which is carbon neutral. Very little carbon is emitted. In fact, no carbon in emitted when you co-generate from these sources. So, this approach in environment friendly. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, let me just say a little about gasohol production. You get gasohol by blending petrol with ethanol and it can be used to propel or run vehicles. This is a technology that is known across the world and in this country. In the early 1980s, gasohol was produced in this country but was stopped because there was no political goodwill and the multinational companies objected to it because it was reducing on their profits. This would benefit this country a lot as it is already benefiting other countries where gasohol is produced. This country has a lot of potential for producing gasohol because we have oil distillers in the country. There is one in Muhoroni; the Agro-chemical and Food Company, the Molasses Complex in Kisumu which is run by Spectra International and there is one in Miwani. Those distillers produce a lot of ethanol which can be blended with petrol to give us gasohol or with diesel to give us diesohol. That would lower the cost of running vehicles and would save on our foreign exchange that we use to import the fossilized fuel. When we blend ethanol with petrol, we are reducing the amount of petroleum that we use in this country. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this is a technology that is already in use in other countries. In the United States of America (USA), for example, 10 per cent of the fuel used to propel vehicles is from gasohol. That means that 10 per cent of petroleum in the USA is blended with gasohol. That is what we actually want in this country. There should be some minimum requirements set by the Government in regard to the use of gasohol. We have the material but the problem we have is that we are using a lot of money to import those materials. In Canada, gasohol 3546 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES August 29, 2007 is expected to have 35 per cent market penetration by 2010. In Australia, 10 per cent blending is being done. In India it is 5 per cent and in Kenya it is zero, and yet, we have the raw materials that can be used. All we need is legislation to set the minimum level of blending. We need legislation to set a time period when we shall achieve the minimum blending. That is what we need in Kenya. We also need budgetary allocation to support ethanol sub-sector development so that we can have enough ethanol to blend with petroleum products to produce gasohol and diesohol. We need a tax waiver as in other countries for investors who produce ethanol for blending with petroleum products. With those comments, I beg to move and ask Prof. Anyang'-Nyong'o to second the Motion."
}