East Africas’s geothermal green energy revolution

In Olkaria, on the edge of the Hell’s Gate National Park, are five power plants that produce around 800MW - that’s enough to power more than four million homes a year.

The sound of green energy is hissing, it comes from the steam that creates geothermal power, and it is the reason Kenya's now the 7th largest producer of geothermal energy in the world, and is blazing a trail in the East African region.

The tectonic plates here - and across Africa’s Great East Rift Valley - are being forced together or wrenched apart, pushing super-heated steam close to the Earth’s surface.

Japan and other international partners have been working with Kenya to develop geothermal power for decades.

This geothermal power means Kenya - which also relies on hydroelectric power - can better cope with the effects of climate change.

Cyrus Karingithi is from Geothermal Resource Development, Kengen, Olkaria.

"We have a lot of droughts which have been with us for quite some time now, for the last 3 years and the country has not felt the impact of the drought in terms of power generation because of the geothermal installed in Kenya."

And Olkaria is just the beginning, as Cyril explains.

"Our geothermal potential is 10,000 MW from 23 sites and what we have installed to date is just from two sites, here in Olkaria and a small plant in Eburru. So we have a huge potential that is untapped, actually, I don’t think we have tapped one percent."

The Japanese International Cooperation Agency - JICA’s relationship with Kenya goes back decades and Japan has invested 852 million USD in Olkaria.

Iwama Hajime is the Chief Representative, of JICA in Kenya.

"They can utilise their own resources, there is no need to import energy. The price of geothermal power is very low and