Kenya Power yet to offer satisfactory explanation on inflated bills

Electricity Pylon power line transmission tower at sunset

State power distributor Kenya Power last week held a question and answer session with journalists and customers in a bid to explain why customers have been receiving abnormally billing reports. 

The company management, flanked by the Energy Cabinet Secretary Charles Keter, assured Kenyans that all their questions about the billing and token generation system will be answered. 

Shortly after the briefing got underway, however, it was obvious the State utility company could not provide adequate explanations and altogether avoided difficult questions plaguing many of its 6.6 million consumers. 

The first of these questions was the Sh150 monthly fixed cost charge. The fixed cost charge is meant to cater for the utility’s cost of providing the service including logistics and customer care.

However, when asked how the charge was arrived at, Kenya Power could only direct consumers to a link to calculate their bills.

The company ignored questions about why consumers had to use their own resources to reach out to the company for assistance even after paying the fixed cost charge for this service.

The utility firm also ignored questions about why the cost of electricity today is higher despite the addition of geothermal generated electricity onto the national grid.

Data from the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) indicates that installed capacity in the country’s geothermal wells has gone up almost 300 per cent from 236 megawatts (MW) in 2013 to 644 MW last year.

In comparison, capacity for hydro and thermal have grown by five and 10 per cent respectively - meaning that Kenyans should be consuming more of renewable energy today bringing down the overall costs especially in the even of last years’ drought crippling sources from hydro – a fact Kenya Power admitted in it’s latest annual report.

“The country’s two main water reservoirs, Turkwel and Masinga, were gradually depleted to lows of 1,106 and 1,036 meters above sea level (masl )compared to required operational minimum levels of 1,105 masl and 1,037 masl respectively,” explains Kenya Power in part.“Unlike in the past when such occurrences would adversely affect our supply capability, we were able to utilise enhanced geothermal capacity complemented with thermal generation to meet demand thereby avoiding load shedding and procurement of expensive emergency power.” 

Data from KNBS, however, indicates electricity prices last year hit a five-year high. The cost for 50KW/h, where most domestic consumers fall, went up from Sh533.2 in 2016 to Shh597.3 last year - a 12 per cent increase.