Ormat Technologies has been awarded its first well head power plant in the Menengai geothermal field in Kenya, as part of the country's tender for geothermal development concessions. The project is to be executed on a build-operates-transfer (BOT) principle. The geothermal field is located about 180 km West of the country' capital of Nairobi.

Kenya's geothermal resources have been estimated at about 10 GW spread out across 14 sites in the Rift Valley. Geothermal Development Company (Kenya, state owned) is already involved in drilling activities as part of Phase 1 of a project estimated at 400 MW of capacity.

Ormat has been present in Kenya since 2000, as the owned and operator of the Olkaria III geothermal power plant, which is being expanded to reach about 84 MW of capacity.

[source: Ormat Technologies]