Kenya aims to complete the construction of a 891 km-long crude oil pipeline between Lokichar in north-western Kenya to the south-eastern port of Lamu by the second quarter of 2021. The US$2.1bn pipeline would enable Kenya to export crude oil from its domestic reserves, discovered by Tullow Oil and Africa Oil in 2012.
This project is an alternative to a planned Uganda-Kenya crude oil pipeline project, that was agreed in August 2015; the pipeline would have stretched from oil fields in western Uganda (border with the Democratic Republic of Congo) to the Kenyan coast, following an existing oil product pipelines in the north of the country to Lamu in Kenya, where an export port would be built. The pipeline was expected to be completed in 2018-2019. However, in April 2016, Uganda rather decided to build its export pipeline through Tanzania, after Total raised security concerns over the Kenyan route.