Barriers And Driving Forces For Industrial Energy Efficiency Improvements In Kenya

Abstract

Kenya having a Vision 2030 of transforming into an industrialized, middle income country has plans of increasing its power generation to meet the growing demand by the industries. However, this has to be done in a sustainable way to avoid any externalities. Since the introduction of Vision 2030 in 2008, Kenya has significantly expanded its renewable energy in order to generate a reliable and affordable energy while producing little or no greenhouse gases emissions. The Kenyan Government through sensitization, has ensured that high energy consumers take up energy management measures by adopting more efficient energy technologies and introduction of conservation measures within their organizations. Over the years, the government of Kenya has made tremendous progress towards energy management. This commitment has been seen with the introduction of the Energy Management Regulation of 2012. This regulation calls for the integration of energy management measures including the mandatory energy audits and drafting of energy management measures of which should be implemented within three (3) years, after the audit. This explorative and qualitative research was conducted to study the barriers and driving forces manufacturing industries have been facing in implementing the energy management recommendations drawn after the mandatory energy audit. In order to get a clear picture of the barriers and driving forces, interviews were done using questioners and where possible face to face interviews of energy managers and others that are directly responsible for the conversion and consumption of energy within the manufacturing companies. A quantification method of the questions and results was used, 0 being least important to 10 being most important, so as to make it simpler for the respondents to rank their barriers and driving forces. This study was however limited to the manufacturing industries in Machakos and Nairobi Counties. Out of 15 requests, a total of seven (7) industries agreed to participate in the research. They were from the food processing, paper processing, food, soap and detergent manufacturing, petrochemicals and chemical and plastic product industries. All of the interviewed companies had complied with the energy management regulation of 2012; out of the seven (7) industries, four (4) companies had received their Energy Compliance certificate from the Kenyan Energy Regulatory Commission and the other three (3) were still being assessed or processed by the energy regulator. The main barriers were found to be economic barriers and organizational barriers including but not limited to lack of funds and lack of time or other priorities by top management. The main driving forces were found to be market and policy related including but not limited to the adoption of energy efficient technologies in order to reduce operation costs, thereby leading to increased profit margins and the introduction of the Energy Management Regulation of 2012. A number of recommendations were drawn from the study that ranged from policy to organizational related including the introduction of incentives by Kenyan Government to companies that complied with directives, and the improvement of energy sizing of equipments within the organization.