What we could learn from Africa, about renewable-led development

Global discourse on climate and renewables must include Africa in addition to the three leading carbon-emitting countries: China, USA, and India.

These three countries generate half the planet’s carbon emissions, so a solution to the climate problem will continue to depend heavily on them and their energy trajectories.

The importance of the three leading emitters also lies in their population, which is about 3.2 billion (about 40 percent of world population). It also depends on the dynamics of economic development and the critical and often complex transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy in these and other developed countries.

But that pattern of economic development and population demographics will change dramatically over the coming decades. India will continue to develop economically as the world’s most-populated country. China, Japan, and most of Europe, on the other hand, are already experiencing a sharp decrease in population. The USA, which will depend on immigration to achieve modest population growth over the coming decades, is now a political battleground between fossil-fuel interests and state-led renewables.

Earth will attain a plateau in population of about 10b by 2085. But while many countries have falling populations, others are growing over the coming 60 years.

Africa will have a population of 3.5b – more than a third of the planet’s population – within 60 years.

The African Union is a continental union of 55 sovereign states of which Algeria is the largest and Nigeria is the most populous. Development across these states is highly diverse and uneven, but though Africa is the least developed continent it is also one of the most dynamic.

It is quite likely that Africa will be the first continent that grows from a low level of development to an advanced economy using mainly renewables rather than fossil fuels.

The remarkable timing of Africa’s rising renewables coincides with global carbon emissions attaining an historic plateau. This is largely because of emissions of the world’s highest emitter, China, peaking and now decreasing, having followed a long-term progressive and planned shift from fossil fuels to solar, wind, hydro and nuclear. This fortunate alignment of two major but separate renewables stages in two parts of the world carries very positive messages for the future of the planet’s climate restoration.

Africa holds many of the cards for the future of the global climate. Although it is a developing continent, it is also a dynamic region in terms of energy evolution. Energy growth rates in Africa are high, which – starting from a low base – has been driven by high demand, and increasingly cheap solar and wind sources. It does have low levels of grid reliability but distributed micro-grids have rapidly gained traction to address this.

It is important to consider North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa separately. The former is emerging as one of the world-leading regions for solar potential and development in providing green energy to European economies. Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria are moving rapidly into utility scale renewable energy and into grid integration. Solar and wind capacity has increased by about 300 percent since 2016 in the region. Morocco, for example, is now generating 40 percent of its energy from renewables.

In Sub-Saharan Africa – with Nigeria, Tanzania, Kenya, and Rwanda leading – renewables already account for roughly half of the installed power. Of this half, 80 percent is via legacy hydro but with solar capacity growing at up to 30 percent a year over the last five years.

In the last decade, installed solar power in Sub-Saharan Africa grew from 1GW to 15GW. South Africa has added more than 6GW of solar and wind since 2021, and Kenya now has a fifth of installed solar capacity.

In total, Sub-Saharan Africa has added more than a tenfold increase in utility-scale solar in a decade. Mini-grids and distributed solar power are expanding at up to 20 percent a year. The World Bank has helped by up-scaling solar programmes in several Sub-Saharan countries, including Zambia and Senegal.

Africa now accounts for 70 percent of the world’s global solar home deployments.

The result is that sub-Saharan Africa has one of the highest global growth rates in renewables, starting from a low base, while North Africa is moving from domestic decarbonisation to building the capability to sell energy or energy products (such as green hydrogen) to other countries, including some in the EU, while also ensuring it has a reliable, affordable, and stable supply of energy itself.

Africa looms as being the first major region in history to pursue industrialisation on renewables first, rather than starting with fossil fuels. It is in the broader interests of the international community that Africa’s strong moves into decarbonised energy continues to succeed, and so to help humanity to restore the planet’s climate. Perhaps New Zealand’s politicians may find inspiration from a less-developed country that is showing such dynamism?

Africa, in the future, could be seen as pulling the final plug on global atmospheric warming. And given the 2085 population projection, future Africans will be among the primary beneficiaries.