#kenya news

[kenyastax]

Kipchumba Murkomen opens up on his KSh 50k belt, KSh 900k watch: "I want to be honest" https://kenyastax.com/kipchumba-murkomen-opens-up-on-his-ksh-50k-belt-ksh-900k-watch-i-want-to-be-honest/

[themusicadvocateafrica]

Reject Finance Bill Protests: Impact and Aftermath in Kenya

Get Exclusive Insights on Music, Film, Books, Media & Culture by Subscribing to our Magazine. Type your email… Subscribe Reject Finance Bill Protests: Impact and Aftermath in Kenya June 26, 2024 By George Robert Asewe Founder The Music Advocate Africa #BreakingTheSilence “Facing the music” is an idiomatic expression that means accepting the consequences of one’s actions, especially when…

[tongoamedia]

Exclusive: Tongoa Weekly Round Up

Dear subscriber, We apologize for not giving or writing the weekly review last weekend bare with us, in today’s review we start we the news that shocked many as Raila and Ruto met and made Truce now what next for them we have also prepared you with other hit head news updates take a look. 1.Ruto and Odinga Unite in Bid for AU Commission Chairmanship,2. Faith Odhiambo Elected President of Law…

[no-passaran]

33-year-old Ugandan marathon athlete Rebecca Cheptegei, who competed in this summer's Paris Olympic Games, has been killed by her ex-boyfriend. He doused her in petrol, set her on fire and burned her alive when she came back from church with her two daughters.

Gender-based violence is a major concern in Kenya, where Cheptegei lived and worked. In 2022, at least 34% of women in Kenya said they had experienced physical violence, according to a national survey.

Her death comes after the killings of fellow East African athletes Agnes Tirop in 2021 and Damaris Mutua in 2022, with their partners identified as the main suspects in both cases by the authorities.

Our thoughts are with her family, who are left without their loving relative and the family's main breadwinner.

[billget-blog]

Nairobi City Plunges into Darkness: A Rare Glimpse at the Impact of a Power Outage

The city of Nairobi, Kenya, experienced a sudden and unexpected power outage recently, plunging millions of residents into darkness. The situation was chaotic and disorienting, leaving the city’s streets eerily quiet and still. In this exclusive footage, we take you through the aftermath of the power failure and show you how people are coping with the sudden disruption. The power outage caught…

[sitting-on-me-bum]

A hippo emerges from the water covered with greenery in the Masai Mara nature reserve, Kenya

Photograph: Ann Aveyard/Animal News Agency

[reasonsforhope]

African poverty is partly a consequence of energy poverty. In every other continent the vast majority of people have access to electricity. In Africa 600m people, 43% of the total, cannot readily light their homes or charge their phones. And those who nominally have grid electricity find it as reliable as a Scottish summer. More than three-quarters of African firms experience outages; two-fifths say electricity is the main constraint on their business.

If other sub-Saharan African countries had enjoyed power as reliable as South Africa’s from 1995 to 2007, then the continent’s rate of real GDP growth per person would have been two percentage points higher, more than doubling the actual rate, according to one academic paper. Since then South Africa has also had erratic electricity. So-called “load-shedding” is probably the main reason why the economy has shrunk in four of the past eight quarters.

Solar power is increasingly seen as the solution. Last year Africa installed a record amount of photovoltaic (PV) capacity (though this still made up just 1% of the total added worldwide), notes the African Solar Industry Association (AFSIA), a trade group. Globally most solar PV is built by utilities, but in Africa 65% of new capacity over the past two years has come from large firms contracting directly with developers. These deals are part of a decentralised revolution that could be of huge benefit to African economies.

Ground zero for the revolution is South Africa. Last year saw a record number of blackouts imposed by Eskom, the state-run utility, whose dysfunctional coal-fired power stations regularly break down or operate at far below capacity. Fortunately, as load-shedding was peaking, the costs of solar systems were plummeting.

Between 2019 and 2023 the cost of panels fell by 15%, having already declined by almost 90% in the 2010s. Meanwhile battery storage systems now cost about half as much as five years ago. Industrial users pay 20-40% less per unit when buying electricity from private project developers than on the cheapest Eskom tariff.

In the past two calendar years the amount of solar capacity in South Africa rose from 2.8GW to 7.8GW, notes AFSIA, excluding that installed on the roofs of suburban homes. All together South Africa’s solar capacity could now be almost a fifth of that of Eskom’s coal-fired power stations (albeit those still have a higher “capacity factor”, or ability to produce electricity around the clock). The growth of solar is a key reason why there has been less load-shedding in 2024...

Over the past decade the number of startups providing “distributed renewable energy” (DRE) has grown at a clip. Industry estimates suggest that more than 400m Africans get electricity from solar home systems and that more than ten times as many “mini-grids”, most of which use solar, were built in 2016-20 than in the preceding five years. In Kenya DRE firms employ more than six times as many people as the largest utility. In Nigeria they have created almost as many jobs as the oil and gas industry.

“The future is an extremely distributed system to an extent that people haven’t fully grasped,” argues Matthew Tilleard of CrossBoundary Group, a firm whose customers range from large businesses to hitherto unconnected consumers. “It’s going to happen here in Africa first and most consequentially.”

Ignite, which operates in nine African countries, has products that include a basic panel that powers three light bulbs and a phone charger, as well as solar-powered irrigation pumps, stoves and internet routers, and industrial systems. Customers use mobile money to “unlock” a pay-as-you-go meter.

Yariv Cohen, Ignite’s CEO, reckons that the typical $3 per month spent by consumers is less than what they previously paid for kerosene and at phone-charging kiosks. He describes how farmers are more productive because they do not have to get home before dark and children are getting better test scores because they study under bulbs. One family in Rwanda used to keep their two cows in their house because they feared rustlers might come in the dark; now the cattle snooze al fresco under an outside lamp and the family gets more sleep.

...That is one eye-catching aspect of Africa’s solar revolution. But most of the continent is undergoing a more subtle—and significant—experiment in decentralised, commercially driven solar power. It is a trend that could both transform African economies and offer lessons to the rest of the world."

-via The Economist, June 18, 2024. Paragraph breaks added.

[wachinyeya]

Sugarcane is a widely grown crop in the Nile Basin, but its destructive effects on soils, water resources and biodiversity have become increasingly apparent.

As the thirsty crop draws down water resources, aquatic species like the critically endangered Nubian flapshell turtle suffer a loss of habitat, forage and nesting sites.

In an effort to revive soils, diversify diets and incomes, and boost water levels that many animals rely on, communities are implementing agroforestry projects in lieu of monocultures.

The resulting “food forests” attract an array of wildlife while refilling wetlands and river systems where the culturally important flapshell turtles swim.

[tieflingkisser]

Femicide in Kenya: Protesters decry rising violence against women

The killing of more than a dozen women in Kenya this month is causing an outcry. Protesters have marched in major cities calling for more protection for women and girls. Al Jazeera’s Fintan Monaghan reports.

[enriquemzn262]

2024 Kenya Finance Bill protests.

[tongoamedia]

Tongoa Media Weekly Review

1.Embakasi Tragedy: Gas Plant Owner and Officials Arrested Following Fatal Explosion2.Former Treasury Chief Henry Rotich Declines Senior Advisor Role in Ruto’s Office3.Joseph Irungu Convicted of Monica Kimani Murder; Jacque Maribe Acquitted4.Mbeere North Shocked as Teacher’s Love Tragedy Ends in Suicide5. High Court Temporarily Blocks eCitizen School Fee Payments6. DCI Seizes Massive Bhang Haul;…

[textless]

I mostly stayed close to home in Arizona in 2023, except for a giant amazing trip to Kenya in July. These are five of my favorite photos from the trip, for this year's Gray-Card Memorial Top Five:

Baby elephant, keeping up

Lions together

Lilac breasted roller

Mother and baby giraffe

Sunset acacia

I feel lucky to have seen these things, and would remember them anyway... but it's awfully nice to have pictures to look back on.

Happy new year, Tumblr.

[dandelionsresilience]

Dandelion News - October 15-21

Like these weekly compilations? Tip me at $kaybarr1735 or check out my Dandelion Doodles on Patreon!

1. EV owners volunteer to drive voters to the polls in 11 states (and you can too)

“ChargeTheVote.org is a nonpartisan voter education and engagement initiative to enhance voter turnout in the 2024 election by providing zero-emission transportation in electric vehicles (EVs) to local polling locations. ChargeTheVote will also host a webinar for those who are interested in participating this coming Tuesday, October 22 at 7pm Eastern time.”

2. Kenya moves 50 elephants to a larger park, says it’s a sign poaching is low

“The elephant population in the […”Mwea National Reserve”…] has flourished from its capacity of 50 to a whopping 156 […] requiring the relocation of about 100 of [them…. The] overpopulation in Mwea highlighted the success of conservation efforts over the last three decades.”

3. Australian start-up secures $9m for mine-based gravity energy storage technology

““We expect to configure the gravitational storage technology [which the company “hopes to deploy in disused mines”] for mid-duration storage applications of 4 to 24 hours, deliver 80% energy efficiency and to enable reuse of critical grid infrastructure.“”

4. Africa’s little-known golden cat gets a conservation boost, with community help

“[H]unting households were given a pregnant sow [… so that they] had access to meat without needing to trap it in the wild. […] To address income needs, Embaka started […] a savings and loan co-op[… and an] incentive for the locals to give up hunting in exchange for regular dental care.”

5. 4.8M borrowers — including 1M in public service — have had student debt forgiven

“That brings the total amount of student debt relief under the administration to $175 billion[….] The Education Department said that before Biden's presidency, only 7,000 public servants had ever received student debt relief through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. […] "That’s an increase of more than 14,000% in less than four years.””

6. Puerto Rico closes $861M DOE loan guarantee for huge solar, battery project

“The solar plants combined will have 200 megawatts of solar capacity — enough to power 43,000 homes — while the battery systems are expected to provide up to 285 megawatts of storage capacity. [… O]ver the next 10 years, more than 90 percent of solar capacity in Puerto Rico will come from distributed resources like rooftop solar.”

7. Tim Walz Defends Queer And Trans Youth At Length In Interview With Glennon Doyle

“Walz discussed positive legislative actions, such as codifying hate crime laws and increasing education[.… “We] need to appoint judges who uphold the right to marriage, uphold the right to be who you are [… and] to get the medical care that you need.””

8. Next-Generation Geothermal Development Important Tool for Clean Energy Economy

““The newest forms of geothermal energy hold the promise of generating electricity 24 hours a day using an endlessly renewable, pollution-free resource[… that] causes less disturbance to public lands and wildlife habitat […] than many other forms of energy development[….]”

9. Sarah McBride hopes bid to be first transgender congresswoman encourages ’empathy’ for trans people

““Folks know I am personally invested in equality as an LGBTQ person. But my priorities are going to be affordable child care, paid family and medical leave, housing, health care, reproductive freedom. […] We know throughout history that the power of proximity has opened even the most-closed of hearts and minds.”“

10. At Mexico’s school for jaguars, big cats learn skills to return to the wild

“[A team of scientists] have successfully released two jaguars, and are currently working to reintroduce two other jaguars and three pumas (Puma concolor). [… “Wildlife simulation”] “keeps the jaguars active and reduces the impact of captivity and a sedentary lifestyle[….]””

October 8-14 news here | (all credit for images and written material can be found at the source linked; I don’t claim credit for anything but curating.)

[zazozazo2]

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