Kenya Power and Lighting Company signs new contract with Indra

The Kenya Power and Lighting Company has recruited the services of Spanish global technology consultancy Indra to help with optimising its grid management processes. Indra will leverage its comprehensive management solution InGRID to implement the improvements at every stage of power supply. 

As the Kenyan economy grows into its role of being an economic hub for East Africa, the government has become increasingly aware of the importance of a stable power distribution system as a crucial foundation for economic growth. Consequently, this year has been riddled with major development projects in the country’s power infrastructure.

The drive began in April, when the country took a step towards the development of a 35 megawatt geothermal power plant, having called for consulting support with the same project. Last month, the country turned to the consulting industry again for support with adding 500 megawatts of capacity to the Olkaria Geothermal Field – a project funded by the United States Energy Association as part of its Power Africa initiative.

Having bolstered its capacity for generation, Kenya has now put things in motion to make the distribution process smoother by a considerable margin, through a deal with Spanish consulting firm Indra. The Madrid-based firm has been operational for over two decades, during which time it has assumed a truly international character with a presence in 46 countries and further sales operations in 140 countries, generating annual revenues of over €3 million.Among a number of others, Indra’s flagship products include InCMS – a multi-faceted customer management system – and InGRID, which is a comprehensive solution for grid management that spans every stage of the distribution process. When the Kenya Power and Lighting Company (KPLC) first began the upgrade of its operations in 2016, its immediately on-boarded InCMS to help serve its customers.

KPLC now uses InCMS to manage over 7 million customers across the country, and would appear to be satisfied with Indra’s services so far, given the fact that it has signed a contract to implement InGRID, which will optimise operations beyond just customer management.

For the overall power grid operation, InGRID leverages technological applications to monitor flows in energy, allowing for immediate detection of any leak or loss of pressure. In addition to this internal detection system, InGRID also facilitates the automatic recording of power outage reports that come in from customers.

Using this information, the solution creates incident logs, and subsequently develops an optimal route for the service team to reach the location of the cut and the best strategy to rectify the issue. As a result, the duration of the power outage is reduced considerably, which simultaneously brings down the loss in revenue and the costs of grid management.   

Other provisions in the new contract include the leveraging of a third product developed by Indra – IGEA– which is a geographic information system designed to refine KPLC’s location capabilities. The contract also includes a pilot project involving the implementation of advanced grid management systems at a test group of stations, using internet of things devices to measure their output and feasibility.