Energy Cabinet Secretary Davis Chirchir has called on county governments to set aside funds for investment in order to help stabilise electricity supply to the national grid.

Chirchir said most of the country’s electricity supply comes from the Eastern side but Western Kenya and the rest of the country also have the potential of producing some electricity for the country through harnessing of the available resources to produce electricity from hydro, solar sources and wind sources to help meet the growing energy needs.

The CS also called upon Members of Parliament to set aside money from the National Government Constituency Development Fund (CDF – NG) kitty for investment in electricity generation to help meet demand. “The country`s electricity supply currently stands at 75 percent of the households and this can be grown to cover 100 percent of the country if collaboration between the national and the country government and partners is enhanced,” Chirchir observed.

The CS was speaking in Naivasha on Friday at the close of a four-day induction training for the National Energy Planning Committee which included County Executive Committee (CECs) members in charge of energy dockets in all the counties.

Intergrated framework

 Participants came up with an Integrated National Energy Planning framework and regulations (INEP) that will help consolidate efforts by government agencies, private sector and development partners in a coherent manner to provide energy services to all Kenyans.

 The INEP seeks to champion the status of clean cooking to be a top priority under the energy access at both national and county levels, complete with facilitative budgets for implementation and will also address electricity generation, transmission and distribution, energy access covering electricity and clean cooking solutions, energy resource assessment and development, bioenergy development; and energy efficiency and conservation.

 CS Chirchir directed that the document be subjected to scrutiny by stakeholders such as the relevant Parliamentary Departmental Committees on Energy before it is launched at a later date.

Chirchir noted that Schedule 4 of the Kenya Constitution 2010 has devolved some aspects of the Energy Sector but added that necessary legislation needs to be enacted to facilitate it.