Energy Poverty Impacts Three Billion People. Time to Think Big.

The world’s energy access definition is currently just 50-100 kWh per person per year, barely enough to power a small fan, a few lights, and maybe charge a cell phone.

How renewable energy can be a game-changer for Africa's desalination industry By 2050, it is expected that there will be at least 800 million Africans living in regions with acute water scarcity (where the renewable water resources capacity is less than 1000 m3/capita/year).1 A recent study on the potential growth of the desalination market in developing countries estimated the demand for desalination in Africa’s most water-scarce countries to reach 37 Mm3/day by 2050, satisfying total municipal water demand for urban populations; which is an increase of more than 1500% compared to the current installed capacity in these countries.1 FIGURE 1: Projected desalination capacity in sub-Saharan Africa’s most water-scarce countries by 2050 According to the FAO, the agricultural sector has the highest water demands in these regions, which makes desalination a key enabler for food security. African governments are already taking serious steps to develop more desalination plants.

Globally, nearly 2 billion people – about half of them in sub-Saharan Africa – lack access to safe drinking water.

Over one billion people globally are now estimated to live in slums or informal settlements.1 This population is growing as conflicts, natural disasters, and climate change fuel further displacement from rural areas.2 In sub-Saharan Africa, somewhere from 50-60% of the urban population of 200 million lives in informal communities that face structural barriers to securing legal access to the electricity grid. For residents of informal communities who cannot afford the connection fee or provide required tenancy documents (among other barriers), the only viable alternative is to connect informally through a local electrician.

Next week is make-or-break for the United States to show an actual alternative to Chinese-backed infrastructure. President Biden will host 49 African leaders December 13-15 in an orchestrated effort to show that the United States is no longer disengaged with the continent and to rebuild trust with a region where one in four people will live by mid-century.

Europe’s energy crisis is aggravating a decades-old tension between the developed and the developing world. As wealthy countries increase natural gas imports (including from Africa), many of them are maintaining policies that restrict development finance for gas-fired infrastructure projects in poorer nations.

The fight over when – or even whether – to use development finance for gas-fired power plants in poor countries has become overly contentious and counterproductive.

Nigeria wants to achieve a net-zero emissions energy system In November 2021, at the United Nations climate change conference (COP26) held in Glasgow, President Muhammadu Buhari announced Nigeria’s commitment to achieving net-zero emissions by 2060.

Third Way and Energy for Growth Hub have been mapping the global market for advanced nuclear over the last few years, tracking both projected energy demand growth to midcentury and various metrics on civil nuclear “readiness” for countries around the world.

We’ve worried that energy projects in Africa, especially renewables, were at risk from rising interest rates and an increasingly unstable global economy.