Powerhive, a renewable energy mini-grid company providing clean energy to thousands of families in rural Kenya partnered with DfID on a pilot programme bringing electric vehicles (EVs) to rural Western Kenya. You can see our first blogs post kicking off the project here and here.

As part of the second phase of this pilot, we brought in a total of 33 EVs including electric 3 wheeled tri-cylces (tuk-tuks) and electric motorcycles (boda-bodas) to our mini-grid sites in Kisii, Western Kenya. In this post, we’ll cover some key lessons learned from getting the vehicles ready to test.

Electric cargo tricycle at our staging area in Kisii

Logistics — new vehicles equals new processes

In mid-August 2019, Powerhive was excited to have our first batch of electric vehicles arrive at the port of Mombasa. We had expected that within 3 days of the bikes import, we would be running field tests and market surveys. Unfortunately, we encountered a number of delays in processes which meant that testing was delayed by over two months:

• Import inspections — Due to miscommunication from one of our suppliers in China, some of the vehicles were shipped as semi-knocked down units without the requisite inspection completed at origin prior to shipping. This meant that they could not be inspected by the transport regulator National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) at the Port or the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS). The technicians that had been trained in-house on the vehicle assembly and testing were based in Kisii- 790km away. They were therefore sent to Kisii without inspection certificates.
• EV classification — EVs are relatively new to the region and as such the NTSA did not have a classification for the specific models of the EVs that we were importing. This meant that during customs clearance at the Port, they were issued with a generic code by the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA)to allow for clearance.
• Knock on issues with registration — Once the vehicles arrived in Kisii, they were assembled and submitted for registration. However, due to the fact that the models were not classified nor were they inspected by KEBS, there were some bureaucratic hoops to jump through, including some intense lobbying at the NTSA headquarters in Nairobi in order to get the registration completed. This took a month before a majority of the vehicles were finally registered. For the tuk-tuks that were deemed to be commercial vehicles, the NTSA has yet to issue Powerhive with number plates.

Once the vehicles were registered, we were off to the races and the tests began on the bikes.

Passenger tuk-tuk during road-testing in Kisii

Tightening systems to avoid repeat issues

Despite the frustrating nature of these challenges, they did provide a number of useful learning points that have smoothed out our procurement, import and registration process. For instance, for the next batch of vehicles to be imported, we will work more closely with the importer to ensure that we get all the model and make information in advance. We will endeavour to work with suppliers who have some experience shipping to Kenya and are aware of our unique and quite stringent import regulations. We will also ensure that one of our technicians is at the port at the time of vehicle entry.

While the majority of the challenges have been largely unexpected they have produced exceedingly useful learnings that will inevitably assist us and other companies working to bring in EVs to Kenya in the future. We look forward to giving a more detailed update on the vehicle testing soon.