By: OrePulse

Kenyan President William Ruto commissioned a new 66-kilometer, 132-kilovolt transmission line linking Kitui and Wote, built by the state-owned Kenya Electricity Transmission Company (KETRACO), in a move officials said would improve grid reliability in Kitui, Makueni and neighboring counties.

Before the new line, Kitui was supplied through the Mwingi-Kitui line and Wote through the Wote-Sultan Hamud line. The new connection gives each substation a second route for power, so that either line can carry the load if the other is interrupted, according to KETRACO.

The Kitui-Wote section, valued at about 1.2 billion Kenyan shillings, is part of the broader Mwingi-Kitui-Wote-Sultan Hamud transmission corridor, built under the Kenya Power Transmission System Improvement Project with funding from the African Development Bank.

Ruto described the line as a "strategic investment" in Kitui and neighboring counties, linking it to industrialization and job creation.

Energy Cabinet Secretary Opiyo Wandayi said the line would improve power supply for businesses, small-scale artisans and agricultural processing activities, including honey production, in the region.

KETRACO Managing Director Tom Imbo said the interconnected design would let the utility carry out planned maintenance without interrupting supply to customers, and would leave room to meet future electricity demand in Kitui and Makueni counties. KETRACO said the alternative-route design had already proved useful, keeping the town of Garissa supplied through a different route during recent maintenance work at the Kindaruma power station.

China CAMC Engineering built the line under the supervision of KETRACO engineers, following a contract signed in 2019.