Not all border towns in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia can be connected to respective National grids - e.g Moyale Kenya is so far from Kenya's grid and does not make economic sense to connect it so better to connect it to Ethiopia's grid that is present in Moyale Ethiopia - so the import/export 'merry go round' will continue. Planned interconnection of National grids of Tanzania to Kenya and Ethiopia and Kenya will help in trade of power...which is a good thing for regional economies

Actually this makes sense and it's economical to do that ;)

Guess work informs me that......If/when renewable energy power will be over supplied (which I don't see it being soon)...thermal plants can/will be shut off. 2. Electricity from dams can be stored..ie.store water in reservoirs and allow water to run when there's more demand. Lets not assume that we'll be the first to experience a glut.

Look, if/when power gets cheaper its almost certain that wanjiku gets inspired to acquire more gadgets eg fans/ACs for those living in Kisumu Coast Garisa and other hot areas, bigger TVs fridges electric cookers etc for the middle class, cheap power should also attract more power guzzlers

From the internet

To understand matters of power differentiate the following components and then localize it to kengen/kenya's scenario. 1. Power source, 2. Power production technology, 3. Electric power. The reason why u produce and how to distribute eff. is kplc's main headache.
For kengen thus said:
1. Power sources are
a. Hydropower. Can be stored so long as the threshold effective production ranges are observed. Ie. There is margin between minimum dam heig depth/altitude n minimum power uptake n maximum installed capacity vv demanded power
B. Geothermal power. As for Hydro however in other context it's steadier n not so sensitive to weather parterns
C. Hydrocarbon(gas, diesel.... .) Ditto to a n b but insignificant sensitivity to weather cycles
D. Wind and solar. Difficult to store the power sources and varies wildly in a days cycle though cheap
... Other power sources are insignificant in kengen case n do not count
2. Production technology.
This highly depends on the powering medium. Ie power source. However the chosen tech suffer challenges as regards demand cycles n thus enabling storage or limiting it or impending storage of the power source.
Eg.
Water must flow thro a turbine for power production. Below a certain level effective turbine dynamics are unsustainable and production must be stopped.
Gas already burnt in a turbine has to be expelled with or without powering the grids
For this fora technology is irrelevant and a sunk cost
3.electric power. Yes, Power producers ultimate goal. Once produced it must be consumed then n there. Use may be constructive or destructive. If over destructive. If under destructive or in effective. So much production and consumption is so critical that without it u better not be in the biz of power matters. Large scale power storage is possible tho not popular and not efficient. In kengen case storage is not a priority for now considering integrated EA scenario is excess production in one country coincides with related excess dd in another, ie variant whether cycles for heavily hero power (weather sensitive) dependent economies:-regional economies as well.
All in all large scale power storage is costly.

Not entirely correct: remember the connection (for example) between Kenya and Uganda is high voltage (132KV) and can therefore not supply any consumers directly. It goes to substations and gets step downed to distribution voltages. The infrastructure part though is a fair point because as @VVS said, a glut of generated power has to go somewhere before the generators react or get shut down in an orderly fashion.

As for the debate about grid power storage, my contribution is that it is safe to assume in Kenya and East Africa, we do not yet have any serious storage facilities. For our traditional utilities (Kengen, KPLC), there is probably none. The only one that I heard of is what @VVS posted a link to (Powerhive?) which is using solar to supply rural households in Kisii and therefore must have reasonable storage. For large scale, we probably are waiting for Tesla..

The recent blackout in Nairobi is a great lesson on why PRODUCTION can exceed CONSUMPTION when the TRANSMISSION and DISTRIBUTION are not up to par.

http://www.businessdaily...4/-/90cjoh/-/index.html

Massive under-investment spanning decades [since the Moi Error] means Kenya's grid is weak and cannot support increased production/generation of power that needs to be transported & distributed over long distances.

Electrical power is transported at very high voltages & needs to be stepped down even when it gets to industrial users. Illegal connections feeding off transformers make things worse. Vandalism doesn't help either.

As a country, we need the entire system strengthened not just increased generation.

Supply doesn't affect a grid. The quality of a grid affects the ability to transport power from the source to the consumer. Why do you think 'over supply' affects an 'aging grid'?

Overload is more like it. Supply is totally different. The writer makes it look like Juja is the only substation, yet there are others...lessos, Tala etc. The Juja station is old yes and indeed it needs rehabilitation, but a power fault could be caused by lightening (expect many of those in the coming days), power surge...etc

My view is that KPLCs current problem is an architecture/design of its network. We're connecting too much load all over without a redesign of the trunk lines to manage the extra power being pushed through them. We're almost at South African level of chaos. Meanwhile KPLC and Kengen management are preoccupied with tendering. Wait till the rains fall and chickens will come home to roost. Power blackouts lasting days as they firefight outages all over.

Kengen growth is tied at the hip with Kenya economic growth booms and bursts cycles by design/default. Therefore, kengen is analogous to a terminally ill bed ridden or an infant tax payer paying taxes on the medical bills to improve health care when it's clear death will come beckoning before the tax is counted .Every year machines systems, grids and new power sources will be sought and be dropped to feed an ogre called e_con relegating kengen to fortune of economy performance. Once the e_con has plateaued, the Capex hungry kengen dream team will be left with issues of efficiencies and not effectiveness. that time kengen may cease to be a strategic gova's asset and shareholders will enjoy. So, when will Capex demand for kengen be rivaled by its earnings and spare some profit reserves enough to excite the market and spare us the lurking worry of capital demand inform of rit issues? When will that be? Is it 1, 2,3yrs or 10, 20---or say 100yrs? The closet someone has in attempting to answer that is in vision 2030 dream team. Where r kebatis to tells us how r we faring on this front? Do we have electric guzzlers like magnelev or bullet trains or electric/hybrid cars in our country so that we construct a few if not many nuclear powered plants and altogether ditch hydropowered plants since they are ineffective or a nema/ environmentalists guys have done environmental audit and condemned dams and there construction? How many silicone valleys or Tatu cities or how you power dependent institutions like military installations so far r in our economy. These of course will come n demand power. Decommissioning will probably be at a hefty cost so is nukes and that ultimately will require cash strapped kengen to Cash call. Actually for kengen it's a cash call since growth will catch kengen struggling between div. payout to please thirsty shareholders and the planners will always lag behind to keep their job skills relevant. If your not a hopeful of a middle economy or middle lyf economy you may as well not be a hopeful of kengen. Harvest time will come. Yes. By end of maturity or by cycles.