Kenya's Energy Generating Company (KenGen) is expected to officially launch the country's largest geothermal power project ever undertaken in the country's history on Monday.

KenGen Managing Director Eddy Njoroge said the 1.3 billion US dollar project for the development of 280 megawatts of geothermal power in Olkaria, Naivasha, about 100 km northwest of Nairobi, will be officially launched on Monday by President Mwai Kibaki.

"The project will increase KenGen's total output by 25 percent and will raise geothermal contribution to KenGen's total electricity capacity by 35 percent," Njoroge said in a brief statement on Saturday ahead of the launch.

Kenya's electric power generation, largely dominated by water- powered turbines, is gradually seeking to shift the more dependable geothermal and wind powered plants due to the effects of climate change, which has sparked off ecological damage.

The country's seven folks scheme, a combination of dams drawing its waters from forests and deep dams, has witnessed the dwindling of water supplies due to the cutting down of trees and poor rainfall, sparked by unpredictable weather patterns.

Njoroge said the project funded by a consortium of foreign companies is the last major milestone in the construction of the 280 MW geothermal projects that will inject a further 25 percent of current capacity into the national grid once completed in mid 2014. It will provide 2100 Gigawatt hours per year.

"With such a huge boost from this clean, reliable and competitively priced form of electricity, consumer prices will ease as the country will require less generation from the more expensive sources," added Njoroge.

East Africa's worst drought in decades left most hydropower dams drier and with less water to support peak generation and the uncertainty in the Middle East sent oil prices skyrocketing.

Other major contracts on the 280 MW geothermal project are power plant (Lot B) construction being undertaken by a Consortium of Hyundai of Korea and Toyota Tshusho of Japan at a cost of 394 million dollars which was signed in November last year, and the construction of transmission lines and sub stations (Lot C) by KEC International of India signed in December 2011 at a cost of 26 million US dollars.

The overall project management is being carried out by Sinclair Mertz of New Zealand at a cost of 19 million US dollars.

KenGen will be procuring the other components like roads, water, housing complex and offices. KenGen strategic plan puts the power generator on a green energy path, with geothermal expected to provide half of electricity needs of the country by 2018.

With the 280MW project now firmly underway, KenGen has set sights on the next phase of geothermal project that targets 520MW in Olkaria. Drilling contracts for this project will be signed soon.