How Africa is embracing cleantech

I have recently noted that cleantech is booming globally, but what does it mean for Africa ? In today’s post I will try to give a few answers to this crucial question as still 600 million Africans have no access to electricity.

To a study titled Mega Trends in Africa: A bright vision for the growing continent ” Investment in renewable power in Africa is set to grow from a total of US$3.6-billion in 2010 to $57-billion by 2020. “

I have found several other articles on cleantech in Africa in the past few weeks. Let’s review the main ones.

South Africa :

The coal-powered national electricity company is frank about its role in making South Africa the continent’s worst contributor to global warming, but Eskom says it also has plans and pledges in place to ensure it does its part to save the world.

(…) The government also has set a goal of doubling its power generating capacity by 2030 to more than 89,000 megawatts. The cheapest way to do that, Lennon said, would be to continue relying on coal.

Instead, proposals announced in May call for about 46 per cent of the generating capacity to come from coal and more than 26 per cent from renewable sources such as hydro, wind and solar.

Morocco :

A massive new renewable energy project is being planned in Morocco that will combine hydropower and wind power in one single location — a world’s first, at least at this scale. The 1 gigawatt project will double the existing hydropower capacity of Morocco.

(…) Morocco has quite admirable renewable energy goals: 10% of electricity by next year, and 42% of electricity from solar power by 2020.

Congo :

At double the size of China’s Three Gorges Dam, the 40 GW Grand Inga hydropower project, to be built on the Congo River under an agreement between the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa, will be the world’s largest by a wide margin.

It will increase Africa’s electricity generating capacity by one-third.

Ethiopia :

(t)he Ethiopian Electric Power Coroporation (EEPCO) this past week announced it’s starting construction of six wind power projects and one geothermal power plant.

In total, electricity generation capacity for the renewable energy projects totals more than one gigawatt (1 GW), Ethtiopian news service NewsDire reported.

Two good articles summing up the current situation are available at Cleantechies and CleanTechnica.

 

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