Tag Archive for: africa

Acumen, the $250M blended finance facility, plans to give 16 sub-Saharan African countries access to electricity with off-grid solar energy.

Building a solar power ecosystem in 16 sub-Saharan African countries

How to give households in the poorest and toughest-to-reach countries in sub-Saharan Africa access to electricity? How to do that, while also building a sustainable and thriving solar power industry in those markets?

Those questions are what the Hardest-to-Reach Initiative aims to address. Launched late last year by “patient capital” pioneer Acumen, the $250 million blended finance facility plans to give 16 sub-Saharan African countries access to electricity with off-grid solar energy. The goal is both to help Acumen-backed enterprises already providing solar energy in Kenya expand to these nations and to incubate small local companies.

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Source: Forbes

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Amped Innovation developed a solar-powered fridge to be deployed in rural Africa, where millions of people have limited electricity.

These fridges are powered by solar panels and ice batteries

Until recently, a store selling groceries in a village in Zambia couldn’t sell cold drinks: It didn’t have access to electricity to power a fridge. But the store now has a solar panel on the roof connected to a solar fridge that’s stocked with drinks and ice. The business owner has nearly doubled overall sales.

The store was one of the first to get a new fridge designed by Amped Innovation, a Bay Area-based company that’s now scaling up production of the appliance. They wanted to help tackle a widespread problem—even though the energy grid is quickly growing in Africa, millions of people still aren’t connected or have to deal with frequent outages.

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Source: Fast Company

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Healthcare facilities in poorer countries could be electrified using solar energy within 5yrs for less than $5bn, putting an end to the risk of life from power outages

Solar energy could power all health facilities in poorer countries and save lives, experts say

All healthcare facilities in poorer countries could be electrified using solar energy within five years for less than $5bn, putting an end to the risk of life from power outages, experts will argue at Cop28 this month.

“I would like the international community to commit to a deadline and funding to electrify all healthcare facilities,” said Salvatore Vinci, an adviser on sustainable energy at the World Health Organization and a member of its Cop28 delegation. “We have solutions now that were not available 10 years ago – there is no reason why babies should be dying today because there is not electricity to power their incubators.

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Source: The Guardian

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Africa leads the way in terms of the average potential of solar energy around the world, finds Statista.

Africa leads the world in solar power potential, research finds

Figures from the Global Solar Atlas for The World Bank, as analyzed by Statista, reveal the average potential of solar energy around the world and as this infographic shows, Africa is out in front. When combining the average long-term practical yield of a utility scale solar energy installation in each country, Africa’s 4.51 kWh/kWp/day is ahead of second-placed Central & South America’s 4.48, while North America is further behind on 4.37.

The assessments “exclude areas due to physical/technical constraints, such as rugged terrain, presence of urbanized/industrial areas, forests, and areas that are too distant from the centers of human activity”, but do not consider “soft constraints, i.e., areas that might be unsuitable due to regulations imposed by national or regional authorities (such as conservation of cropland or nature conservation)”.

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Source: World Economic Forum

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