info.afrindex.com
China-Africa Trade Information Service
info.afrindex.com
China-Africa Trade Information Service
Photo from Daily Nation
Rising electricity costs are a difficult problem for investors in the dairy industry.
Aside from being expensive, the power supply has been unreliable with increased interruptions due to huge demand.
Over the recent past, the country has been faced with rescheduled power supply forcing processors to look for alternative energy sources in order to keep their operations running round the clock.
A five-hour power blackout in the country last month saw many milk firms which were not prepared for such a long outage incur huge losses.
In a bid to address this recurrent problem, processors are investing in sustainable energy sources. Some of the big boys in the lucrative industry have invested heavily in green energy and have installed solar panels in their cooling stations.
The New Kenya Cooperative Creameries (KCC) has installed steam generation engines which it says have cut the cost of power as it seeks to make sure the energy usage is manageable.
"Steam generation is one of the green energy we are using to run some of our factories and the good thing is that it has been tested and is perfectly working in our Eldoret factory," said New KCC Head of Corporate Affairs Ms Stacy Too.
"We have managed to cut down the energy cost by at least 30 per cent of the current consumption and this is a good saving as this money is ploughed back to make sure our factories are up and running round the clock."
Ms Too said the new methods of conserving the energy will soon be rolled out in other factories in Dandora in Nairobi, Kiganjo in Nyeri, Nyahururu in Laikipia County and Sotik in Bomet County and other small cooling plants owned by the company across the country.
