@ppcheti
Electricity has finally been restored in Faza and Pate islands in Lamu East after nearly three weeks of blackout.
The two islands with more than 3,000 people were plunged into darkness following the breakdown of the 1500KW capacity off-grid power station that has served the areas since April 2016.
Lamu Woman Representative Ruweida Obbo and other residents camped outside the KPLC offices in Lamu East for days demanding for the restoration of power.
Speaking on Tuesday, Lamu county KPLC business manager Bernad Kataka said some generating sets had failed to work two weeks ago and the company could not immediately restore supply as the station lacked redundancy.
"As standard procedure, all such stations should at least have a standby generating set that is redundant, just in case one fails. This lack of redundancy has been our main challenge," Kataka said.
He said the company had to source a fully refurbished 500KW generating set from its Nairobi South stores. An 500KW alternator for redundancy was recently delivered to Lamu, he said.
Due to complex sea transportation logistics, the generating set finally was delivered last week.
“Power supply has since been restored after we carried out all requisite, mandatory technical protocols and testing to reinstall the generating tests," he said.
"The two islands are now on full, standard power supply,” Kataka said.
(Edited by V. Graham)
