Afrigather This text was contributed to TechCabal by Seth Onyango by way of bird story agency.
Rising knowledge is shedding new mild on the electrical energy panorama in Africa, indicating the oft-cited statistics of these with out energy could be significantly decrease than current figures indicated.
Contemporary evaluation means that increasingly houses and companies are being powered by off-grid options, an element that was not accounted for in previous estimates.
The World Power Outlook 2023 notes a major uptick within the variety of houses and companies turning to solar energy to satisfy their vitality wants.
“This reversion was partially offset by sturdy progress in photo voltaic house system gross sales, which give electrical energy to households not linked to electrical grids. Gross sales of those methods surged previous pre-pandemic ranges final yr, with sturdy progress in West and East Africa,” the outlook states partly.
“Due to elevated photo voltaic house methods gross sales, Nigeria noticed its inhabitants with out entry proceed to drop through the disaster.”
In a current evaluation, the information platform Semafor urged that “one of many causes that quantity appears to have been unchanged for some whereas now’s that quite a lot of work is being completed to develop entry and more and more by non-traditional grid buildouts.”
Conventional approaches to measuring electrical energy entry have predominantly centered on the enlargement of nationwide energy grids, overlooking the rise of home photo voltaic vitality and pay-as-you-go (PAYG) options whose numbers are laborious to seize. The solar is quick being recognised because the one common useful resource for all Africans.
Photo voltaic house methods gross sales soared to report ranges in 2022, with most imported from China. These methods accounted for half of the rise in electrical energy entry in Africa in the identical yr.
The importance of solar energy is additional emphasised by its provision of electrical energy to over 8% of households in sub-Saharan Africa which have entry.
In accordance with the Africa Photo voltaic Trade Affiliation’s (AFSIA) Africa Photo voltaic Outlook 2023 report, the business and industrial phase registered a year-on-year progress of 61.5% within the earlier yr.
By way of main installations, some 949 MW of extra photo voltaic vitality was put in throughout the continent in 2022, a 14% year-on-year increment from the 833 MW added to the grid in 2021.
With 284 MW, Angola had essentially the most installations in 2022. The highest 5 embody Angola, South Africa (111.8 MW), Egypt (80 MW), Ghana (71.3 MW), and Mozambique (41.9 MW).
The report states, “Africa is now house to greater than 10 GW of recognized photo voltaic tasks.”
Nonetheless, estimates from state-run utility Eskom point out that South Africa alone added greater than 1,000 megawatts (MW) of personal photo voltaic capability in simply two months in 2023, based on information platform Semafor.
The rise in photo voltaic installations to June was greater than what was added within the previous six months, highlighting not simply South Africa’s however the continent’s solar energy potential. The installations got here on the again of elevated energy outages throughout the nationwide grid.
“What you’re seeing in these numbers is households and the personal sector taking issues into their very own arms,” Wikus Kruger, director of the Energy Futures Lab on the College of Cape City informed Semafor. “It’s being pushed not by authorities coverage per se, however by desperation.”
Chinese language customs knowledge reveals vital photo voltaic panel imports into South Africa, totalling over 5GW (or US$1.1 billion) since January 2022, with 3.7GW in 2023 alone
Whereas photo voltaic set up capability in Africa has traditionally been pushed by a couple of “scorching spots” akin to South Africa, Morocco, and Egypt, extra international locations are actually adopting photo voltaic initiatives.
This pattern in direction of decentralised, non-grid options like photo voltaic house methods and PAYG fashions is revolutionising electrical energy entry in Africa.
These strategies will not be solely confirmed to be extra adaptable to the various and sometimes distant landscapes of the continent but additionally provide a cheaper and speedy deployment in comparison with conventional grid extensions.
The PAYG mannequin, particularly, is making photo voltaic vitality financially accessible to extra households by permitting customers to pay for his or her vitality consumption in small, manageable instalments. Kenyan PAYG operator M-KOPA lately launched in Soweto as the corporate expands throughout Africa.
Nations like Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, Ghana, and Senegal are nearing their targets for common entry, showcasing the potential of those revolutionary approaches.
