Renewable news from East Africa.
Kenyan Village Coping With Climate Change
Being a farmer in a part of the world that is severely affected by climate change is very difficult. Pauline Karimi, 54, lives in an area that is recovering from a year-long drought. But despite this, her village is covered in green vegetation and farms. Pauline tells us how the help of Trócaire supporters has made this possible.
In the midst of recovering from a deadly drought that took hold of the area for the last year, Pauline’s beautiful home sits in the middle of her now very green farm.
“But it didn’t look this good last year,” she says. The drought, she tells us is one of the worst they have ever had.
Pauline’s village is deep in the Tharaka county of Kenya. In the past, they had been able to rely on rains to allow their crops to grow, but increasingly prolonged droughts due to climate change has meant regular access to water was becoming impossible.
“Last year during the drought, we went to bed hungry because we lacked food and money,” she said. “But thankfully that is now a thing of the past.”
Working together
Along with her husband, she is one of many farmers who took part in a project delivered by Caritas Meru who are working to help people in the area to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Supported by Trócaire, the project brought the local farmers together where they worked to dig trenches, a borehole and a pipe system throughout the village. They were also trained on how to build their own pond as well as ways to conserve water.
This project has changed Pauline’s life. She explained: “My pond has helped me to have a constant supply of water on my farm, hence why I am able to grow so many different kinds of crops.”
On her farm, she has grown millet; sorghum; green grams; onions and cowpeas. She has also implemented a drip irrigation system that allows for effective watering of the plants while conserving as much water as possible.
“I never thought it was possible to produce half of the crops I now have from my farm. We no longer have to worry about food since I am able to grow vegetables that has a constant water supply from the pond,” said Pauline.
The group also has a saving scheme and are able to take loans which they pay back over time. Pauline used one such loan to also venture into fish farming in her pond which helps her to bring in additional income.
“I am glad we can now sell the produce from our farm including the fish because it is less pressure for our children who have their own families to feed. Life is much better,” she said.
https://reliefweb.int/report/kenya/kenyan-village-coping-climate-change
Tackling Wikipedia’s Africa gap with a climate change edit-a-thon
Sponsored content: The first Wikipedia edit-a-thon held on climate change in Africa brought together researchers from all over the continent.
Last week, a diverse group of 30 African researchers gathered in Cape Town to attend the first Wikipedia edit-a-thon held on climate change in Africa.
The event was co-hosted by the Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN), the Future Climate for Africa (FCFA) programme, both managed by South Africa-based NGO SouthSouthNorth, and Wikimedia South Africa.
The researchers travelled from East, West, and Southern Africa, representing 10 countries: Ghana, Senegal, Cote d’Ivoire, Kenya, Namibia, Botswana, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe and South Africa.
The purpose of the edit-a-thon – a term which describes an event bringing a group of people together to edit and improve a specific topic on Wikipedia – was to address an enormous gap on Wikipedia of African content and contributors.
2018 marked a turning point – where more people are online than offline. And as the world’s fifth most popular website with 20 billion page views per month, one cannot ignore the importance of Wikipedia in sharing Africa’s knowledge, experiences and perspectives on climate change with the global community. There is also an incentive for researchers to add their work to the platform as evidence shows that scientific articles referenced in Wikipedia receive more citations.
Africa has the fewest Wikipedia contributors per capita of any other region. A 2014 survey found that Africa contributes only about 1.3% of the world’s editson a monthly basis. Page edits from Hong Kong almost equal edits from the entire continent of Africa (15 000 edits in Hong Kong vs 19 000 edits in Africa per month).
This challenge in terms of coverage and contributors has been identified as the ‘Africa gap’.
And this gap also relates to information on climate change. Contributions on Africa and by Africans on the topic are limited. For example, the word ‘Africa’ does not appear on the climate change page and all notes and references link to American and European research. Prior to the edit-a-thon, the climate change in Africa page only covered the health impacts of climate change on the continent with no information on how climate change might affect the different regions of Africa.
At the event, the president of Wikipedia’s South Africa chapter, Douglas Scott, highlighted that Wikipedia’s aim is “to give free access to the sum of all human knowledge to everyone, everywhere.” But to achieve this, Wikipedia is reliant on diverse contributors reflecting the richness and complexity of the world’s knowledge
At the edit-a-thon, participants included climate scientists, sustainable growth economists, forest and environmental scientists, agriculture, biodiversity and integrated water management specialists, and policy and governance experts.
There were scholars who had studied the effects of climate change on migration flows and population dynamics in Africa as well as climate change impacts on biodiversity and the implications for people’s livelihoods. Some researchers brought with them the latest research on the climate science of Africa from FCFA, and others brought recent research on how climate change is affecting communities in Africa’s semi-arid lands.
With this group there was significant potential to enhance the depth and breadth of climate change information on Wikipedia.
Over the three days the researchers tackled some major gaps on Wikipedia where Africa-related content was lacking, working in groups to use the opportunity to leverage their collective knowledge and understanding to edit larger topics on existing Wikipedia pages such as climate change in Africa, climate change adaptation, climate change and agriculture and drylands.
Katharine Vincent’s reflected on how the editing process worked for the climate change adaptation page, as well as why she thinks Wikipedia is an important tool for research impact.
By the third day the new editors had made significant progress. Andy Nyamekye from Ghana, now based at Wageningen University, noted that for the climate change and agriculture page “in the case of Africa there was virtually nothing. I added content related to West Africa. In our group one thing we kept in mind was making sure the language was accessible. We learned that we need to communicate to a Wikipedia audience in a different way to an academic audience.”
Participants agreed this was just the start of their Wikipedia editing journey. The event closed with everyone looking at future possibilities for editing and creating pages – captured as leaves on a tree. The event also helped spark some potential collaboration. For example, one participant discovered another colleague from the University of Botswana who works in her area: “After the event we will look at working together to improve Wikipedia content on biodiversity and livelihoods. I also plan to go home and tell other researchers about Wikipedia and show them how to edit articles.”
Uganda rejects planned power plant at Murchison Falls
KAMPALA (Reuters) - Uganda said on Wednesday that due to the importance of its famed Murchison Falls as a lucrative tourism attraction it had rejected a hydropower project proposed by South Africa’s Bonang Power and Energy.
The falls lend their name to a 3,900-square-km national park, one of Uganda’s biggest, where visitors can view lions, hippos, elephants, buffalos and giraffes.
Uganda’s cabinet decided to reject the project at its meeting on Monday, said state minister for tourism Godfrey Kiwanda.
“Cabinet rejected the idea entirely. Cabinet is of the view that Murchison Falls is one of the country’s great wonders,” he told Reuters.
In June, Bonang had applied for a permit for a feasibility study to develop a 360 megawatt power plant on the falls, according to a notice issued by the Electricity Regulatory Authority (ERA).
Private tourism operators and nature enthusiasts immediately mounted opposition to the project saying the falls were one of the country’s most prized geographical features and a lucrative tourism site.
“When we considered what we make out of the falls in terms of tourism earnings it was very clear it’s more valuable keeping it (Murchison Falls) as a tourism site,” Kiwanda said.
ERA, he said, had been directed not to allow the feasibility study to proceed.
Located on the River Nile between the Ugandan lakes Kyoga and Albert, Murchison Falls lies about 280 km northwest of the capital Kampala.
President Yoweri Museveni’s government in recent years has been eagerly wooing foreign private power developers, especially in the renewable energy sector, to invest in the country and help boost its generation capacity.
Founded in 2014 by South African entrepreneur, Ernest Moloi, Bonang specialises in renewable energy projects in Africa.
Uganda’s total generation capacity stands at about 1000MW but is set to expand substantially when a 600MW plant on the Nile, Karuma, being developed by China’s Synohydro, is commissioned next year.
The plant is being financed by debt from China which has also financed, via credit, the Isimba hydropower plant launched last year.
https://af.reuters.com/article/topNews/idAFKCN1VI150-OZATP
Power distributor toys with idea of solar energy
A Solar Power Plant in Kabulasoke. According to Electricity Regulatory Authority, the country’s solar energy portfolio currently stands at 50 MW. FILE PHOTO
In Summary
New picture. A mix of centralized and distributed generation; storage close to load centers.
Bidirectional transmission and distribution networks with multiple electric paths OLOLJMKMfrom several supply sources to and between customers.
Mainly automated distributed demand response and storage, complemented with some central resource flexibility.
Uganda’s main power distributor Umeme, during the second public hearing, revealed that they are contemplating over providing solar renewable energy.
“We are in pilot stages, as I speak some of our colleagues, the chief operating officer and team, we are piloting to see how we can go into the solar space,” Umeme’s managing director Selestino Babungi says.
The discussion is based on the reality that extending the grid to the whole country is sometimes more expensive and would take a longer time.
Cognisant of solar energy’s augmenting penetration, he said the solution is aiding the areas isolated from the grid, thus improving the universal power access agenda.
The power grid otherwise referred to as the transmission network length as at 2018 stood at 2569.8Km.
Solar capacity
According to Electricity Regulatory Authority, the country’s solar energy portfolio currently stands at 50 MW with the newest addition of 10MW upon commissioning of Bufulubi Power plant in Mayuge
Four grid connected solar power plants have been commissioned in a three-year period including 10MW Bufulubi, 10MW access solar plant in Soroti district and 10 MW Tororo solar north plant.
The 20 MW Kabulasoke solar plant in Gomba was commissioned in 2018.
Increasing growth in solar energy production is partly attributed to reduction in cost of solar technologies.
Integration
Utilities 2.0, energy access report published by Power for All, advocated for unification of power utilities and private sector decentralised renewable energy providers (off grids).
The integration is expected to push the universal access for all agenda, leaving no one in the dark.
In a publication by ESI Africa, during the Africa Utility week, Ms Kristina Skierka, Power for All chief executive officer noted that utilities and off grid power companies have worked in silos.
“We need to find a path toward universal electricity access that brings the solution providers together and leverages their strengths, while recognising our shared goal of ending poverty as quickly, affordably and sustainably as possible,” she recommended.
Model
The report notes, traditional Utility 1.0 models characterised by monopolistic, unidirectional, and silo operations that have informed power sector design in low energy access (LEA) countries, have rarely created profitable, sustainable energy companies in developing countries, nor have they ended energy poverty.
Low energy access countries can evolve 1.0 utility systems for an integrated future, using digitisation, decentralisation, and data to enable grid and non-grid energy to collaborate and maximise connections that improve quality of life.
“By leveraging digitisation and data analytics to integrate Decentralised Renewable Energy (DRE) technologies, utilities have new alternatives to grid extension, faulty transformers and unprofitable connections. In collaboration with DRE companies, utilities can find more cost-effective ways to leverage smart meters, storage and distributed generation to enable reliable, affordable universal energy access,” the report reads in part.
Going digital
The report highlights that digitised technologies such as integrated smart meters, predictive tools such as Gridwatch (which uses cell phone charging outages to predict transmission failure), and remote monitoring systems standard in many DRE products—can create an intelligent network that taps mini-grids or networked rooftop systems in case of distribution issues, transmission outages and demand response
PowerGen acquires E.on SE’s African microgrid business
Off-grid power solutions developer PowerGen Renewable Energy has acquired Tanzania-focused mini-grid company Rafiki Power from its parent company, Germany utility giant E.on SE.
The two African companies want to use their newly-combined clout to build “momentum for private utilities” on the continent, according to a press release.
PowerGen, which develops, builds and operates micro-utilities and claims to serve more than 10,000 customers across several African countries, will take over Rafiki’s assets, which include eight Tanzanian solar-plus-storage mini-grids that serve 950 customers, as well as a project pipeline, the intellectual property of its software, and staff.
Aaron Cheng, PowerGen president, said in a statement that “PowerGen and E.ON Off-Grid Solutions have shared a common vision for a long time: to transform lives by building the energy system of the future in Africa. We are excited to combine our experience, knowledge, resources, and cultures in order to further our progress towards this shared vision.”
Microgrids offer huge opportunity in Africa and other emerging markets where many rural communities live far from the grid and a large proportion of people do not have access to electricity.
E.On SE's decision to offload its East African microgrid business bucks a wider trend of major energy companies investing in smaller off-grid power solutions firms, in particular those that target emerging markets.
In June, French battery company Saft, wholly owned by oil and gas giant Go Total, bought US microgrid firm Go Electric, which deploys microgrids for military and commercial sites across North America. In January, energy giants General Electric and EDF contributed to a funding round totalling US$5 million to fuel Silicon Valley-based microgrid provider Off Grid Electric’s expansion into Ghana. In October, Rolls Royce Engines invested in Berlin energy storage solutions start-up Qinous and EDF took a 50% stake in Togo-focused off-grid specialist BOXX.
https://www.energy-storage.news/news/powergen-acquires-e.on-ses-african-microgrid-business
Kenya has potential to become the largest green energy exporter
Windturbines at the Ngong Hills on October 16, 2019
The Lake Turkana Wind Power project was officially launched last month, becoming the largest project of its kind on the continent and a brilliant example of Kenyan potential in the energy sector.
Indeed, we are on track to fully level up green energy production by 2020. Along with being an important environmental achievement, our expertise in this area can transform our greatest domestic asset into a tool of global importance.
The Lake Turkana project is an impressive achievement, with 365 wind turbines operating with a capacity of 850 kilowatts each, increasing our electricity supply by 13 per cent.
The plant is registered with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, and approved at the Gold Standard rating, with the transmission line able to carry three times the amount of power that will be produced by the existing plant, allowing for a smooth upgrade in the future.
Importantly, the project was funded by a consortium of African and European companies. Not only is the plant a serious upgrade for our own electricity grid, but it will also earn the developers Sh23 billion in carbon credits over its lifetime.
Along with being good news for shareholders, it increases the attraction of Kenya’s green energy investment potential.
The profitability, stability and expertise now on show in Kenya is worth 10 times its weight in electrons. We are already a global leader in the geothermal sector and renewable projects like the Garissa Solar Power Station and the Ngong Wind Power Plant have showcased Kenya’s potential as a global green powerhouse for almost every form of renewable energy.
International powerhouse
As we can see from Turkana, there is already significant international interest in investing in our domestic market. Beyond building green power plants, billions of shillings are being invested in an ambitious umbrella plan aimed at connecting all homes to electricity by 2022.
The best part is that Kenyan innovation is at the heart of this move, with off-grid renewable energy companies pioneering in bringing services to cut-off areas.
Overall there are plenty of investment-ready projects raring to go, and now that financial supply far outweighs demand, it is time to turn our focus to becoming an international powerhouse - a green energy exporter to the world.
There will naturally be an increase in energy demand in the coming decades, both from our neighbours and further afield. In our region, the advances in off-grid solutions will allow for whole new paradigms in access to electricity.
According to International Energy Agency, the worldwide energy demand is expected to grow by 27 per cent by 2040, or the equivalent of 3,743 million tonnes of oil. As the Paris Agreement takes effect and non-complying countries are put under increasing pressure, we can expect much of the demand to be in the form of renewable, not fossil fuels.
Energy exporter
Developing countries such as ours and our neighbours are on course to increase our combined global energy demand by 45 per cent, growing our share of global demand from 64 to 70 per cent.
Many of our neighbours and countries across Africa have similar potential for green energy. However, they are certain to lack the economic opportunities afforded to Kenya to realise that potential.
Kenya’s impressive domestic situation and attractive investment outlook presents a unique and timely opportunity to become Africa’s predominant energy exporter.
To press home our advantage, all we must do is continue, and even expand, the vision of the current policy; investing accordingly with established partners who see the potential inherent in our country.
We are not the only country in Africa harnessing this potential. Namibia recently announced its ambitious renewable energy strategy, which includes building four renewable energy plants to harness energy from biomass, solar and wind over the next five years.
Ethiopia and other countries have also developed some of their natural renewable resources. However, for many governments it will be difficult to replicate the investment potential inherent in the increasingly sunny Kenyan economy.
If Kenya can supply cheap, green electricity to the region and beyond, the ripple effect on the wider economy is incalculable.
Not to mention that we will be achieving an even more important goal, sustainable development at a time where all of our futures depend on a green power revolution.
https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/2001339468/kenya-has-potential-to-become-the-largest-green-energy-exporter
3 September 2019
