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

The world’s fourth-most populous country is rapidly reaching universal electrification, with almost 99% of its more than 270 million people considered electrified. However, the sector is not without its problems. A major outage hit the greater Jakarta area in mid-2019, affecting over 30 million people and paralyzing the economy, while shorter blackouts are a common occurrence.

Kenya Power is one of the largest electric utilities in Africa, connecting more than 7.5 million customers.1 Like many utilities the world over, Kenya Power struggles with fully recovering operating costs.

The debate over which countries should pursue nuclear energy is timely because the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) is considering lifting its prohibition on financing nuclear power projects.

The UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 7 commits the world to ending energy poverty by “ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all by 2030.” The dominant measurement of progress against SDG7 is the access rate, which measures the number of people with basic household electricity.