As Africa Climate Summit promotes solar, off-grid power ramps up below the Sahara
Access to electricity remains a major challenge for over half a billion people in sub-Saharan Africa, and power outages are common even for those who are hooked up to the grid
NAIROBI — A walk through the busy business district of Mombasa Road in Nairobi, or even a rural community in Kisii County, Kenya, highlights something that's getting attention at the African Climate Summit in Nairobi this week — solar power that is not connected to the grid.
With or without the encouragement of government policy, families and businesses are choosing off-grid solar in the face of an unreliable grid. According to the World Bank, the number of so-called minigrids, meaning solar systems that support a cluster of homes or businesses, has grown from 500 in Africa in 2000 to 3,000 today.
In Kenya, the price of electricity has risen due to higher fuel costs, driving some to form their own local grids.
It's not just individual homes in Kenya: Solar energy’s reliability and lower cost, despite initial high installation capital, has attracted steel manufacturers and cooking oil factories, who form some of the biggest clients for one Nairobi-based company.
CP Solar’s managing director, Rashmi Shah, said his company has installed 25 megawatts of solar systems in the past six years. “It is a very clean source of energy,” he said and clients are able to recover their initial costs through savings within the first four years.
“We are not polluting the air at all; we are not raising the temperatures; we are not affecting the climate of the Earth. So that is why more and more emphasis is coming to cleaner energy,” he told The Associated Press.
Over half a billion people in sub-Saharan Africa don't have reliable access to electricity. Power outages
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