Safaricom – Transition to solar energy

Safaricom has committed to be net zero by 2050. As a result, it has set scientific targets to enable it this goal. One of the measures taken to achieve this goal is solarisation of Safaricom’s sites. Since 2021, Safaricom has installed 1432 solar sites and incorporated remote monitoring capabilities to track its performance. Safaricom has also build dashboards that have incorporated analytics and automation to check on the performance of the solar sites. There is also an energy optimisation team that frequently checks on the performance of these sites. 

In 2024, the solarisation project resulted in an annual avoidance of 7.67 gWh of electricity, 1.28 million litres of diesel and 4712 tCo2 emissions. This has catapulted Safaricom to be in line with its science-based targets. 

During the installation process, Safaricom learnt lessons regarding to proper site survey, inclusion of vendors to ensure equipment matching, consideration of environmental and climate challenges to achieve installation run rate, spares process management and ways to avoid shading especially from upcoming buildings. 

This project had internal stakeholders’ collaboration (energy, field, finance, security, supply chain and sustainability team) and external stakeholders (maintenance service providers, landlords and community).