Kenya Seeks Nuclear Power Infrastructure

New submitter Snirt writes "Kenya is seeking to develop a viable nuclear energy program within the next 15 years to meet its growing energy demands. A government commission formed last year is conducting a feasibility study and the University of Nairobi is setting up programs to train people for the nuclear program. Critics say they're concerned about plant worker safety and the risk of environmental contamination. Some 86 percent of Kenyans do not have access to electricity, relying on firewood and kerosene to meet their energy needs. Electricity is expensive(1$=KES 90), and the supply is limited."

viable alternatives?

[vencs]

With sunshine and 30C+ temperatures throughout the year, can they resort to a faster solution of power generation with solar-energy based alternatives?
Thats', of course, after they fail to find any fossil fuels in their compund..

Re:viable alternatives?

[MichaelSmith]

First world countries have started to flog obsolete nuclear technology to third world counties. Fire sale everybody!

Re:Definition of irony

[unixisc]

If the Kenyans build a Thorium plant, they won't have to worry about nuclear waste. Aside from that, nuclear energy is the cleanest energy there is. Such a plan would be key to getting them out of poverty - once their energy problems are all solved, they can then get into other things, like manufacturing. One nuclear plant in the West of the country would be good enough - far from Somalia/ Maybe they can even share it w/ Uganda and South Sudan, and split costs that way, if it is too expensive.

Re:Definition of irony

[Hognoxious]

If you wanted to design a country to be no good for renewables, you'd come up with Germany.

Long winter - solar's out.
Short coastline - wave power out.
Long way from atlantic - less wind - turbines out
Few mountains, mostly in one area - hydroelectric out

Re:Definition of irony

[Anonymous Coward]

Lol, I'm from Germany, and

> Long winter - solar's out
That's what pumped-storage hydroelectricity is for. And having your CSP plants in one of the southern neighbor countries, like spain or even north Aftica. Look up "project Desertec".

> Short coast line - wave power out.
Wave power is about the dumbest "green" energy source anyway. Also, you underestimate the space those things would need.

> Long way from atlantic - less wind - turbines out.
Then why the hell are our countrysides (lots of flat areas with farms and fields) so full of them? I highly doubt that they built them, if there wasn't some profit to be made.

> Few mountains, mostly in one area - hydroelectric out.
I don't know what "Germany" you went to, but... I know lots of hydroelectric dams in Germany. The south is pretty mountainous, and a the areas where there are height gradients definitely suffice all around the country.

Also, we're in the EU. There is no need to put the plants into the country. We're a export economy. We can afford to say "hey, if you cut off our power, we cut off your supplies" as an argument. Most EU countries strongly rely on their neighbours anyway. So putting them into Norway and Spain is not a problem.