The Great East African Rift System (EARS) is one of themajor tectonic structures of the earth that extends for about 6500 km from the Middle East (Dead Sea-Jordan Valley) in the North to Mozambique in the south. This system consists of three main arms: the Red Sea Rift; the Gulf of Aden Rift; and the East African Rift which develops through Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Malawi and northern Mozambique floored by a thinned continental crust. The EARS is composed of two rift trends; the eastern and western branches. The western branch develops from Uganda throughout Lake Tanganyika, where it joins the Eastern branch, following the border between Rwanda and Zaire. The western branch is, however, much less active in terms of volcanism although both branches are seismically and tectonically active today. The East African Rift is one of the most important zones of the world where the heat energy of the interior of the Earth escapes to the surface in the form of volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and the upward transport of heat by hot springs and natural vapor emanations (fumaroles). As a consequence, the EARS appears to possess a remarkable geothermal potential. The eastern branch, that forms the Ethiopian and Kenyan rifts, possesses, by far, the most extensive geothermal resource base in Africa and one of the most extensive in the world. Countries such as Djibouti, Uganda, Eritrea and other countries in southeastern Africa have lesser but still important resource bases. Using today's technologies, Eastern Africa has the potential to generate about 2,500-6,500 MW of energy from geothermal power. East African Countries using, or having carried out research on, geothermal resources include: Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. Among these, Kenya is the leading country in using geothermal energy for electricity production followed by Ethiopia. Kenya is generating a total of about 130 MWe of electricity using geothermal energy resources. In Ethiopia, a geothermal pilot power plant with a total installed capacity of 7.2 MWe was built but is not operating due to technical problems. Countries such as Djibouti, Eritrea, Tanzania and Uganda are at exploration stage. Other countries such as Rwanda, Malawi and the Malagasy Republic have, to date, not gone beyond the resource potential inventory work.
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