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CONSTRUCTION WORLD
JUNE
2017
Another milestone on Africa’s premier wind power project
WorleyParsons reports that the project delivery and
engineering consultancy is nearing completion of
its major scope of work on the Lake Turkana Wind
Power (LTWP) Project in Kenya,
This includes a key milestone of 120 wind turbines attaining Ready
for Energisation (RFE) status in January 2017 and installation of all
365 turbines completed on 5 March in only 362 days.
WorleyParsons’ South Africa team was contracted in Novem-
ber 2014 by the LTWP consortium to provide overall project
management, engineering review and construction management
services for the Lake Turkana Wind Power Project, which will be
the largest wind farm in Africa, and one of the largest in the world,
when completed. The project scope included 365 wind turbines of
850 kW each, an electric grid collection system and a high voltage
substation, upgrades to 210 km of existing road, an internal site
road network and a 160-man self-contained permanent village. The
substation, road infrastructure and village have been completed.
The wind turbines are expected to be commissioned in the last
quarter of 2017 upon completion of the 428 km transmission line
provided by Kenya Electricity Transmission Company.
“Despite some logistical, climatic and community challenges, we
have delivered our scope of work to date for the LTWP Project within
the stipulated timeframe and budget,” says Tim Gaskell, power
business unit manager for WorleyParsons RSA.
“We have worked closely with the customer and with the sub-
contractors to address these challenges and propose workable
solutions. For example, as Lake Turkana is located within a desert-
like environment, it seldom rains, but flash floods do occasionally
occur and the existing road designs did not factor this in. We
assisted with improving the road design to cope with flooding,”
says Gaskell.
“We also deployed additional people to assist local sub-
contractors to adhere to the high standards required for the project.
We have a strong focus on localisation and social upliftment
to ensure that the surrounding communities benefit from this
project, and have placed particular emphasis on health and safety
awareness as most of the local workforce has not been exposed to
any health and safety practices,” adds.
The LTWP Project represents one of the biggest single private
investment in Kenya’s history, and aims to supply 300 MW of reliable,
low-cost wind turbine generator capacity to the Kenyan national grid,
equivalent to about 15% of the country’s current installed electricity
generating capacity.