Industrial Attachment : KenGen Olkaria Geothermal Power Station

As part of my training I am supposed to attend practical hours at a company of my choice for approximately 100days.During this time I should be exposed to market quality machines and put into practical what I’ve been learning through.
Welcome to Industrial Attachment Series of posts.
After successful I landed in KenGen Olkaria Geothermal Power Station. Being the only in Africa, I feel privileged being here and brushing shoulders with great engineers in this place.

The Power Station
The Olkaria Geothermal Power Station is managed by KenGen, a Government Parastatal which is responsible for all state power stations. This unique power station is located on the floor of The Great Rift Valley near Lake Naivasha. The chief main source of energy is high pressure stream from the ground which is used to drive turbines to produce electricity. There are currently 3 power stations in this field ie Olkaria 1 (KenGen), Olkaria 2 (KenGen), Olkaria 3 (Orpower IPP)
A combined 105MW is derived from the field. Future expansions are underway to increase the output to 200MW harnessing the full potential of Geothermal Power. The Olkaria geothermal field spans a great area and it is located within the Hell’s Gate National Park, approximately 120km from the Capital Nairobi.

The Attachment

Day 1 here wasn’t a walk in the park. After reporting to the station work started immediately. Since the station spans a great area, transport between the two major stations is hard to come by. Today I was stationed at Olkaria 2 – Engineering and Logistics Section where the actual drilling takes place.
Today’s work was trying to revive an idle generator which had not been used for more that 6 years. This 415V Generator is the main source of power for the drilling machinery. It is composed of 2 Gen. electrically coupled together.
After successful tests it produced a clean 413-416V and worked fine. What a dirty work but I learnt a lot.

Pictures