We post here the relevant reports for the power sector in Africa. Feel free to join our efforts and share us any other you may have found. We'd be glad to add them to the list. Just sent an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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Publication date: 2018, April
Author: Tearfund
Description: This report examines the challenge of bringing power to over one billion people who live without electricity, mostly in remote, rural areas in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
Publication date: 2018, April
Author: USAID
Description: This brief provides an overview of the gender dimensions of planning and building large-scale renewable energy infrastructure, such as hydropower and geothermal plants, solar arrays and wind parks generating 10 MW or more.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: IEA / UNDP / IRENA
Description: This document is a part of a series of Policy Briefs being developed to support SDG7 review at the UN High-Level Political Forum to be held in July 2018. The objective is to inform intergovernmental discussions by providing substantive inputs on SDG7 and its interlinkages with other SDGs prepared through inclusive multi-stakeholder consultation processes. The development of these Policy Briefs is coordinated under the auspices of the Ad Hoc Informal Multi-stakeholder Technical Group of Advisors on SDG7.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: CGD
Description: This paper leverages the proliferation of mobile phones in Sub-Saharan Africa to conduct phone-based surveys on energy access and demand. The survey uses interactive voice recognition (IVR) surveys to ask questions on energy service provision, service quality, and demand in twelve African countries: Benin, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: WILEY
Description: Sub‐Saharan Africa desperately needs more electricity. Recent years have seen private investment in renewable energy projects breaking through in the region, primarily driven by well‐designed and implemented auction programs. We review three renewable energy auction programs in the region to improve our understanding of the auction design and implementation elements that have enabled this important transition: the South African Renewable Energy Independent Power Producers Procurement Program (REIPPPP); the GET FiT solar facility in Uganda; and the first round of the Scaling Solar program in Zambia.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: CITE / Solar Sister / wPOWER
Description: This study seeks to understand the impact of one such social enterprise in Tanzania, Solar Sister, in providing access to clean energy—in the form of household solar lanterns—to remote, rural areas, or what we call "last-mile” households throughout this report.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: Bloomberg New Energy Finance
Description: More than 4 billion people are not connected to the internet today, representing a huge opportunity for both development and business. Bridging the ‘digital divide’ for these un-networked billions requires affordable and reliable access to electricity. Power is a crucial element at all stages of providing internet access: from running backhaul services to the core of the network and base stations to powering the devices that consumers use to get online. Yet, across much of the developing world, reliable electricity remains expensive and hard to get.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: Energy 4 Impact
Description: This report is intended to offer campaign-makers and potential campaign-makers, working in the off-grid energy space, with the tools and knowledge to develop a successful crowdfunding campaign. We identify trends common to successful energy access related campaigns (measured as reaching the campaign target) across donation, reward, debt and equity crowdfunding. The report explores success across three broad stages; choosing the right platform and passing platform due iligence, managing a successful campaign period and implementing campaign goals, as well as long run success of the entity raising funds from the crowd.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: NREL
Description: This report discusses of some of the key drivers and considerations that policymakers and decisionmakers face when deciding if and how to regulate electricity tariffs for micro-grids. Specifically, we frame the discussion around tariff options at two different ends of a regulatory spectrum: mandating some variety of national (uniform) tariff versus allowing micro-grid developers and operators to set fully costreflective tariffs that may vary from site to site. We analyze the benefits and drawbacks of these and other options. We also discuss how cross-subsidies and other transitional forms of regulation may offer a regulatory “middle ground” that can help balance the often competing goals of providing price control on electricity service in the name of social good while providing a means for investors to achieve sufficient returns on their investment to attract the necessary capital financing to the market. NREL’s REopt tool is used to model a representative micro-grid system and the resulting levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), which is used to put context and scale around these tariff questions. This simple analysis offers an estimate of the gap between current tariff regimes and the tariffs that would allow developers to recover costs to attract further investment. This analysis also provides insight into the potential scale of subsidies or other grants that may be required to enable micro-grid development under current regulatory structures.
Publication date: 2018, February
Author: Energies
Description: This paper first presents a comprehensive review of microgrid technologies and their applications. It then proposes the STEEP model to examine critically the failure factors based on the social, technical, economic, environmental and policy (STEEP) perspectives. The model details the key dimensions and actions necessary for addressing the challenge of microgrid failure in remote communities. The study uses remote communities within Nigeria, West Africa, as case studies and demonstrates the need for the STEEP approach for better understanding of microgrid planning and development.
Publication date: 2018, January
Author: Dalberg Advisors / Lighting Global
Description: The 2018 Global Off-Grid Solar Market Trends Report is the fourth report in a biennial series established over the past 8 years as the report of record for the off-grid solar industry. While the Lighting Global/GOGLA franchise of six-month market updates (H1 2017, H2 2016) serve as the go-to source of information for investors, industry members, policymakers, and other stakeholders in the off-grid solar space, the flagship Market Trends Report provides an opportunity to step back for reflection on long-term trends, challenges and opportunities—illuminating a path forward for the sector. The 2018 publication takes stock of the industry across six axes: market fundamentals, sales, the competitive landscape, finance, the enabling environment, and impact. It provides in-depth analysis on current market dynamics, projections for the coming five years, and a blueprint for how actors in this market can compete in a swiftly evolving industry ecosystem.
Publication date: 2018, January
Author: AEEP
Description: Achieving universal energy access in Africa remains a significant challenge, and one that must be met in a sustainable manner in order to ensure a secure and renewable energy future for the continent. In light of this challenge, youth have risen to the forefront as advocates and innovators in bringing sustainable energy solutions to their homes, communities, regions and even countries.
Publication date: 2018
Author: AfDB
Description: The economic outlook for the Southern Africa region is cautious. Broad-based economic activity is expected to recover at a slow pace, but the outlook remains modest, given the diverging growth patterns for the region’s economies. Upper middle-income countries turned in low and declining rates of growth. Meanwhile, lower income transitioning economies recorded moderate and improved growth, albeit at reduced rates.
Publication date: 2018
Author: Cornell University, INSEAD, and the World Intellectual Property Organization
Description: The Global Innovation Index 2018 provides detailed metrics about the innovation performance of 126 countries and economies around the world. Its 80 indicators explore a broad vision of innovation, including political environment, education, infrastructure and business sophistication. The GII 2018 analyses the energy innovation landscape of the next decade and identifies possible breakthroughs in fields such as energy production, storage, distribution, and consumption. It also looks at how breakthrough innovation occurs at the grassroots level and describes how small-scale renewable systems are on the rise.
Publication date: 2018
Author: United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA)
Description: The Transmission Roadmap to 2030 is a critical piece of Power Africa's 2.0 strategy, which recognizes that the power generation projects Power Africa is supporting must have adequate transmission and distribution infrastructure to actually bring electricity to millions of people.
Publication date: 2018
Author: IEA
Description: World Energy Investment 2018 provides a critical benchmark for decision making by governments, the energy industry, and financial institutions to set policy frameworks, implement business strategies, finance new projects, and develop new technologies. It highlights the ways in which investment decisions taken today are determining how energy supply and demand will unfold tomorrow.
Publication date: 2018
Author: ALSF / CLDP
Description: The power purchase agreement (PPA) is the central contract for any independent power generation project, especially in emerging markets. This handbook explains the context for the PPA and sets out the key considerations for drafting and negotiating the PPA. It was written by practitioners who have been engaged in power project development around the world for decades and is intended to provide governments, utilities, investors and other interested stakeholders.
Publication date: 2018
Author: PPIAF
Description: Established in 1999, PPIAF is a multi-donor technical assistance facility financed by 11 multilateral and bilateral donors and housed inside the World Bank Group. PPIAF is the only global facility dedicated to strengthening the policy, regulatory and institutional underpinnings of private sector investment in infrastructure in emerging markets and developing countries.
Publication date: 2018
Author: BP
Description: The Energy Outlook explores the forces shaping the global energy transition out to 2040 and the key uncertainties surrounding that transition.
Publication date: 2018
Author: CROWDFUNDRES
Description: This booklet gathers important insights and recommendations in all these dimensions, drawing on a wealth of analysis of relevant data, industry and investor surveys, and stakeholder engagement across the sector. We complement this with a range of case studies that amply illustrate how far renewables crowdfunding has come in recent years.
Nairobi, KENYA