Modelling climate change impacts on hydropower in East Africa

The grid-power systems of the East African community countries (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi) are dominated by hydropower. More than 50 per cent of the grid-connected electric energy supply is from hydropower and future investment plans are similarly dominated by hydro. The East African region is not a homogenous climatic region and the projected impacts of climate change vary from place to place with higher magnitude increases in runoff expected in the northern regions than in the south. The characteristics of the different hydropower systems, such as storage, also vary from site to site, a factor that will affect how different powerplants would fare under climate change. This paper presents the results of hydrological modelling and hydropower simulation for a number of existing and planned sites in the East African hydropower system. The hydropower modelling compares a base period (1961-1990) to a future period (2040 - 2069) under climate change using the A1B SRES scenario.