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Nigeria Moving Into Solar Energy To Spur Business Growth

Nigeria Moving Into Solar Energy To Spur Business Growth

Enphase also says its micro-inverter technology “is designed to allow local, non-specialist electricians and laborers to install and maintain all portions of the electrical system.” Enphase Energy and the Nigerian government hopes the microgrid demonstration project will prove the scalability of a solar microgrid system in a country.

Stepped-up Renewable Efforts

Nigeria is one of six targeted countries under US President Barack Obama’s “Power Africa” initiative announced in June, a $7 billion plan over five years to African companies and organizations providing off-grid solutions that use renewable resources “to double access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa.”

The first Request for Proposals for the $2 million, three-year Power Africa Off-Grid Energy Challenge closed October 16.

The U.S. African Development Foundation teamed up with GE Africa to launch the initiative in Nigeria – and Kenya – “to expand markets, test innovations, and leverage financing to increase the delivery of off-grid energy to marginalized populations.”

The initial funding will award up to $100,000 each, which will be followed by an additional $1.5 million in grants over the next two years to and power economic activities. GE also signed an MOU with the Nigerian Federal Government earlier this year to help develop an additional 10,000 megawatts of power.

According to Shari Berenbach, President and CEO of the United States Africa Development Foundation, than 50 percent of the 150 applications involved solar energy, while rest were based on hydro, wind, and bio-fuels, among others.

“The judges carefully evaluated more than 150 applications to arrive at the eventual winners. We looked out for applications that demonstrated new business models to deliver sustainable, renewable energy to underserved, marginalized populations,” said Berenbach.

The winners of the $100,000 grants were announced at a November 21 event held in Lagos, Nigeria, and include Trans Africa Gas and Electric PLC, GVE Projects Limited and Afe Babalola University emerged in Nigeria.

GVE Projects plans an 18KW solar-powered mini-grid to reach 140 homes in the Egbeke community of Rivers state. Afe Babalola University plans to generate 2.5 megawatts of hydro-electric power that will serve over 10,000 members of the university community.

The Trans Africa Gas and Electric PLC’s project is a “standalone cold storage facility to allow farmers in Jos to cool and store their produce before bringing it to market.” The three Kenyan project winners are Solar World (E.A) Limited, Afrisol Energy Limited and Mibawa Suppliers.

Besides the US Power Africa initiative, Nigeria has been getting plenty of green energy financial help from a variety of other international sources this year.

In July, the European Commission announced $34.7 million in support to improve the renewable energy policy in Nigeria through the newly launched Energizing Access to Sustainable Energy (EASE) program with a focus on the use of renewable energies by small and medium enterprises.

Run in partnership with a $6 million World Bank contribution and $11.6 million from the GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit), the EASE program will also address the deforestation from cutting trees for fuel wood, a main energy source for the majority of the population.

“At the moment, 80 per cent of the population in rural Nigeria have no access to electricity at all. Our overall objective is to help decrease this number significantly, but it is also important to improve the wellbeing of those who do have access, since they often suffer from inadequate lightning to carry out their housework and from inhaling toxic smokes due to unmaintained cooking stoves,”  said European Commissioner for Development, Andris Piebalgs.

Earlier in February, the Climate Investment Funds (CIF) announced an agreement to provide Nigeria with $50 million to support an African Development Bank-supported program designated to stimulate alternative and efficient ways to generate electricity and to reduce dependence on energy sources which contribute to greenhouse gas emission.

The increased announcement of renewable energy projects this year are in line with the Nigerian Power Reform Act requirement that 5 percent of power generation must come from renewable energy by 2020.

And according to the Nigerian government, President Goodluck Jonathan hopes that fast-tracking the development of the nation’s electricity sector will help leapfrog Nigeria to the top 20 most developed economies in the World by the year 2020.