Kenya Electricity Generating Company (KenGen) has installed an electric vehicle charging station in Nairobi as the State agency joins other actors steering the push for e-mobility.
Catherine Nyambala, an engineer at KenGen, said the power producer will in the coming days import electric cars to test the station and help with data that is key to boosting policy legislation for e-mobility.
The revelation comes barely a month after Kenya rolled out the first electric bus as the shift to e-mobility gathers pace. E-mobility is a critical plank in the global push to reduce pollution through the use of clean-powered vehicles that will significantly cut the reliance on diesel and super.
“At KenGen, we have an electric vehicle charging station already installed and soon we are bringing in the electric vehicles to help in data collection for e-mobility,” Mrs Nyambala said during a panel discussion at the Sustainable Energy Conference held last week.
“E-mobility is the fastest way that as a country we are going to do the transition because of displacement of fuel.”
Kenyan electric vehicle start-up BasiGo introduced a Sh5 million passenger electric bus in March in anticipation of increased demand for environmentally friendly transport. The 25-seater bus is designed by the world’s largest manufacturer of electric buses BYD Automotive and has a 250-kilometre range with a recharging period of fewer than four hours.
Kenya Power said that it has enough power to charge electric vehicles. It said that has enough electricity to charge 50,000 buses and two million motorcycles during off-peak hours.
