Kenya is going green, joining an increasingly global frenzy to combat climate change by employing environment-friendly practices which promise millions of new jobs.

The “green” jobs would be created in coming years as a result of the impact of the emerging renewable energy economy.

“Countries are going green in their quest to generate clean energy and Kenya must not be left behind,” Finance minister Uhuru Kenyatta said last week during his delivery of the 2009/2010 budget.

To enhance supply of environmentally friendly and affordable energy to the economy, investment focus will be on the development of renewable energy sources such as geothermal, wind, bio-fuel, biomass and the use of solid waste.

To generate clean energy and transform Kenya into a green economy, the government plans to establish a Green Energy Facility to offer interest-free long-term loans to firms that opt to replace conventional high-cost energy generation with low-cost green energy alternatives.
Funded by the State, it will be managed by a consortium of selected banks.

Last month Kenya secured a $405 million (about Sh30 billion) loan to finance the development of a wind power project.

The financing of the Lake Turkana Wind Power Project is facilitated by the African Development Bank (AfDB), and will add an additional 300 Megawatts (MW) of power into the national grid by 2012.

The loan, which represents 70 percent of the project cost, will be sourced from development finance institutions and commercial sources.

AfDB is the Mandated Lead Arranger (MLA) for the loan, which has a loan tenor of up to 12 years and 9 years from commercial sources and will $135 million of the cost.

The project will construct a “wind farm” consisting of 353 wind turbines, each with a capacity of 850 KW.

New report

The wind power project is expected to start production in June 2011 and reach full production by July 2012. In March 2009, Ormat Technologies Inc. commissioned the third phase of a facility at Kenya’s Olkaria geothermal plant, adding to the electricity grid 48MW.

According to a United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) report titled Green Jobs: Towards Decent work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World, changing patterns of employment and investment due to efforts made to reduce climate change and its effects are already generating new jobs across various sectors and economies.

Currently, renewable energy generates more jobs than employment in fossil fuels, and projected investments of $630 billion by 2030 would translate into at least 20 million additional jobs in the sector.

Published at the end of last year, the report also finds that the ongoing negative effects of climate change will continue to impact workers and their families, especially those dependent upon agriculture and tourism.

“Action to tackle climate change as well as to cope with its effects is therefore urgent and should be designed to generate decent jobs.”

Analysts at UNEP say that green economy will be a significant participant to bringing an end to the current global recession— the key reason being the enormous investment in alternative energy.

“When we look back, 2009 will be viewed as a monumental year in terms of the economy,” says the report.

It identifies as critical to the green economy the willingness of governments around the world to jump-start their economy by investing billions of dollars into these once-scoffed-at energies.

Mr Kenyatta said that the government will adopt energy saving methods including replacement of all conventional bulbs with energy saving bulbs produced locally. As part of this programme, the government says will fast track completion of five identified power generation projects.

The minister intends to spend Sh500 million and expects to elicit donor support through this initiative to scale up its operation. He also allocated an additional Sh400 million for the installation of solar technologies in the Arid and Semi-Arid regions.

To address deterioration in the forest cover and quality of the urban environment, Mr Kenyatta said the government has initiated efforts to rehabilitate the five water towers while a master plan for the restoration and rehabilitation of Nairobi River Basin has been developed to guide conservation efforts. The State is also banking on Public-Private Partnerships to drive the programme.

“We are doing this because we want to ensure we do not bequeath our mistakes to the next generation,” he said.

The budget also allocated Sh1.2 billion for tree planting programmes in 20 primary schools in every constituency while earmarking Sh7 billion to expand the rural electricity programme.