Africa has enormous solar energy potential

AFRICA has immense potential for solar photovoltaics which has barely been utilised up until now.

But a pioneering spirit is spreading across the continent, with many countries paving the way for ambitious solar photovoltaic projects.

An Intersolar Solarise Africa Market Report 2020, prepared by the Becquerel Institute and the German Solar Association (BSW-Solar) with support from Intersolar Europe, the world’s leading exhibition for the solar industry, analyses the market conditions in 16 African countries and presents multiple potential scenarios for the future.

Electrification and renewable energies are right at the top of the political agenda in many African countries.

And yet, the actual rates of installation in the past year remained low.

With around 6,6 gigawatts (GW), the continent is only home to around 1% of the photovoltaic capacity installed worldwide as at the end of 2019.

While the use of photovoltaic technology continues to rise globally, almost no new solar systems are being set up in the sunniest regions of the earth.

The Intersolar Solarise Africa Market Report 2020 takes a closer look and presents an analysis of the market in select African countries, for the first time, including Senegal, Mali, Uganda, Madagascar, Kenya and Tunisia.

The report investigates the various phases of the photovoltaics markets for 16 African countries as well as their individual regulatory conditions and potential for photovoltaic installations.

It also issues a clear call to utilise the potential that already exists.

Closer observation shows that there is plenty happening on the continent.

Many countries have projects in the pipeline, some on a significant scale, and the underlying political conditions are improving all the time.

For instance, Algeria is planning to install photovoltaic systems with a combined capacity of 4GW by 2024, while the end of 2019 marked the completion of Egypt’s Benban Solar Park.

With a total installed capacity of 1,5GW and six million photovoltaic panels, Benban is the largest solar park in Africa and among the biggest in the world.

Africa is on the threshold of a major transformation, which can best be described as a kind of wave that just keeps swelling.