Renewables in Africa

Karekezi, S "...surveys (PDF) the dissemination of renewable technologies in Sub-Saharan Africa...and attempts to evaluate the potential for these technologies to meet the energy needs of Africa’s poor..."

In contrast to the industrialized world which is worried by the long-term global environmental impact of current patterns of energy production and use,African countries are largely pre-occupied with the immediate problems of reversing the persistent decline of their centralized power systems as well a meeting the longstanding and pressing demands for a minimum level of modern energy services for the majority of their poor - many of whom have no electricity and continue to rely on inefficient and environmentally hazardous unprocessed biomass fuels...At the institutional level, African countries needs to realize that the centralized energy model is becoming increasingly obsolete in developed countries where independent power producers riding on the back of the privatisation wave are increasingly the norm rather than the exception. Rather than continue to expand its centralized power systems, African countries should begin to develop a decentralized energy structure which would better match its current capital resources and management capability as well as position it well to adapt to future energy technologies and systems.