Despite Owning 60% of Global Solar Resources, Nigeria, Others’ Clean Energy Penetration Stunted at 1%

Emmanuel Addeh

Although it has about 60 per cent of the world’s best solar resources, Nigeria and other African countries have a paltry 1 per cent deployment of clean energy sources, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has said.

The outlook for the country and several African countries are not enviable, is stressed, with over 640 million persons on the continent without access to energy, that is, just about 40 per cent, the lowest in the world.

According to the respected energy data-driven organisation, in its Africa Energy Outlook 2022 report, although Nigeria and other African countries remain a minor contributor to global emissions, yet it needs to do far more to adapt to climate risks than the rest of the world.

But the growing demand by the West that African countries should embrace renewables however contradicts current moves by a key European country, Germany, which is calling on rich nations under the G-7 to put a hold on the planned halt in the financing of overseas fossil fuel projects by the end of the year.

Nigeria has always insisted that although it is committed to the netzero plan by 2060, it cannot abandon the explorations of fossil fuels overnight, maintaining that gas, which to some extent is a cleaner hydrocarbon will be used as transition fuel.

By 2050, the report stated that Africa will still account for no more than 4 per cent of cumulative global energy related CO2 emissions, regardless of the scenario, adding that funding for climate adaptation could reach $30-50 billion per year by 2030, a huge increase on the $7.8 billion in 2019.

For Africa to pursue the energy pathway set out, it explained that there needs to be a change in the way energy projects are financed as between 2015-19, 70 per cent of energy investment on the continent went to oil and gas projects, primarily predicated on foreign off take.

According to the EIA, priority needs to be given to making more effective use of public capital, from international and domestic sources, in order to better leverage private capital.

“While Africa accounts for almost one fifth of the world’s population, it attracts less than 5 per cent of global energy investment. This is spread unevenly across the continent.

“Ten countries accounted for 90 per cent of private investment in energy and electricity infrastructure on the continent over the last 10 years,” it said.

Although historically, fossil fuel supply has accounted for the majority of energy investment in Africa, driven by oil production, however, since 2016, it said,  capital spending on fuel supply has fallen by more than a fifth with a shift to less risky projects elsewhere.

“Clean energy investment has failed to make up the difference, with around 60 per cent of total spending still going to fossil fuel supply over the past five years.

“The clean energy transition in Africa requires not just a shift in investment flows away from fossil fuels, but also a near doubling of total capital over 2026-30 compared with 2016-20,” the IEA projected.

However, despite foreign pressure to jettison fossil fuels, Minister of State, Petroleum Resources, Mr Timipre Sylva, has said that he country will not jettison her God-given resources.

Insisting that Nigeria’s goal should be energy sufficiency to put an end to the ravaging energy poverty in the country, he stated that it would be unfair to expect that Nigeria as well as other energy-deficient countries will be stampeded into the mix.

“Nigeria should harness all the available energy resources to assure, not only availability and accessibility but also affordability and sustainability, to meet its energy demand,” he said.