ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - More than one million people across the Kurdistan Region are receiving 24-hour electricity and hundreds of private generators have been shut down, the government’s Runaki Project announced on Thursday.
The Runaki Project team said that an additional 500,000 people in the Kurdistan Region gained access to 24-hour electricity over the past month, raising the total number of beneficiaries to more than one million.
The Runaki Project is the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) initiative to provide round-the-clock power across the Region and end dependence on private, diesel-powered generators.
According to statistics obtained by Rudaw, the majority of Runaki subscribers are in Erbil - 860,000, along with 132,000 in Sulaimani and 114,000 in Duhok. This is 15 percent of the population.
The total number of subscribers is 283,000.
With the expanded service, private generators are no longer needed and so far nearly 1,300 of them have been shut down, according to Runaki.
For years, many people have relied on private generators, which are costly and polluting, when the national grid would cut out for hours daily.
This article was updated on June 1, 2025 with new data from the KRG upon their request.
