Towards a renewables-based future for West African States: A review of power systems planning approaches

Bissiri, Mounirah; Moura, Pedro; Figueiredo, Nuno Carvalho; Silva, P.P.

doi:10.1016/j.rser.2020.110019

Cited by 23 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 78 publications

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“…A review of the research base for power systems planning in West African countries found that the majority of studies have been conducted by foreign scholars, organizations, and research agencies (Bissiri et al, 2020). This study contributes to that majority.…”

Section: Study Limitations and Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 81%

“…A key bene t of the OSeMOSYS modeling method is its much lower complexity and learning time, which should make it easier for uptake by LMIC energy planners. However, OSeMOSYS-based literature in West African countries is scarce (Bissiri et al, 2020). It is hoped that the transparency of this study will spur engagement and discourse with the DRC entities who are best equipped to leverage it for positive change.…”

Section: Study Limitations and Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 98%

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Modeling policy pathways to maximize renewable energy growth and investment in Democratic Republic of the Congo using OSeMOSYS

Dalder

Oluleye

Yeganyan

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Keeping global warming from evolving into irreversible climate disaster requires immediate and sustained decarbonization of global energy systems. Of urgent priority are the energy systems in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where billions of people are projected to gain energy access in the next several decades. Therefore, leapfrogging traditional fossil fuel-based electricity production in favor renewable energy technologies is a critical issue area for sustainability. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, political and economic challenges mean $44B in external investment is required to achieve its 2030 emissions reduction targets. Additionally, RETs are often more expensive. This study sought to generate, evaluate, and recommend possible national policies for the DRC government to implement to most effectively boost growth and investment in RETs. Financial incentives were identified as the policy type most practical for DRC. Modeling the resulting energy systems for policy pathways involving a 16% RET subsidy, a 70% fossil fuel tax, and both in combination relative to no-policy baseline scenarios, the scenarios including the tax had the lowest net costs and the highest proportion of RETs (above 90%). Additionally, despite current reliance on hydropower to fulfill 98% of its energy needs, hydropower plays a very minor role in all modeled scenarios. Finally, a post-modeling market potential assessment was performed on the technology that dominated off-grid supply across policy pathways: the 0.3 kW small solar home system (SHS). Based on learning rates for solar PV, demand for the small SHS system in DRC (>160 million units in total) was found to be sufficient to substantially reduce the unit cost as deployment scales. Putting results into context, emissions reductions for the policy pathways were higher than a past study focused on distributed RETs in DRC, and system costs were 15% higher than estimated in other analysis. These results provide a novel contribution to the literature by demonstrating how financial incentive policies can influence RET uptake in DRC specifically. Ultimately, this study yielded four policy recommendations for the DRC government: 1. Pursue financial incentives to catalyze DRC’s renewable energy supply 2. Tax fossil fuel energy production 3. Re-evaluate focus on hydropower 4. Promote DRC as a healthy market for solar home systems

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Section: Study Limitations and Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 81%

Section: Study Limitations and Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 98%

Modeling policy pathways to maximize renewable energy growth and investment in Democratic Republic of the Congo using OSeMOSYS

Dalder

Oluleye

Yeganyan

et al. 2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Their analysis showed that the electrification of rural areas will depend on demand: when grid costs are reduced by half relative to the base scenario, grid connection becomes more favourable for rural electrification. More similar reviews of power system approaches can be retrieved from 50 .…”

Section: Sub-sahara Africa’s Energy Poverty and Renewable Energy Pote...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Juxtaposing Sub-Sahara Africa’s energy poverty and renewable energy potential

Mukhtar

Adun

Cai

et al. 2023

Sci Rep

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Recently, the International Energy Agency (IEA) released a comprehensive roadmap for the global energy sector to achieve net-zero emission by 2050. Considering the sizeable share of (Sub-Sahara) Africa in the global population, the attainment of global energy sector net-zero emission is practically impossible without a commitment from African countries. Therefore, it is important to study and analyze feasible/sustainable ways to solve the energy/electricity poverty in Africa. In this paper, the energy poverty in Africa and the high renewable energy (RE) potential are reviewed. Beyond this, the generation of electricity from the abundant RE potential in this region is analyzed in hourly timestep. This study is novel as it proposes a Sub-Sahara Africa (SSA) central grid as one of the fastest/feasible solutions to the energy poverty problem in this region. The integration of a sizeable share of electric vehicles with the proposed central grid is also analyzed. This study aims to determine the RE electricity generation capacities, economic costs, and supply strategies required to balance the projected future electricity demand in SSA. The analysis presented in this study is done considering 2030 and 2040 as the targeted years of implementation. EnergyPLAN simulation program is used to simulate/analyze the generation of electricity for the central grid. The review of the energy poverty in SSA showed that the electricity access of all the countries in this region is less than 100%. The analysis of the proposed central RE grid system is a viable and sustainable option, however, it requires strategic financial planning for its implementation. The cheapest investment cost from all the case scenarios in this study is $298 billion. Considering the use of a single RE technology, wind power systems implementation by 2030 and 2040 are the most feasible options as they have the least economic costs. Overall, the integration of the existing/fossil-fueled power systems with RE technologies for the proposed central grid will be the cheapest/easiest pathway as it requires the least economic costs. While this does not require the integration of storage systems, it will help the SSA countries reduce their electricity sector carbon emission by 56.6% and 61.8% by 2030 and 2040 respectively.

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“…Mitigation policies must go hand in hand with increased access to electricity through renewable energy technologies to enable prospects for improved livelihoods, and the achievement of sustainable development goal (SDG) targets across key sectors, including agriculture (SDG2), education (SDG4), water (SDG6) and energy (SDG7) (Amoah et al 2020) and in itself enable drivers for economic growth (Bissiri et al 2020). The current energy mix of Africa is almost composed of fossil fuels and biomass, but studies suggest good prospects for targeting renewable energy deployment (Schwerhoff and Sy 2019), although requiring investments and crossborder cooperation (Ouedraogo 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Renewable energy planning in Africa: robustness of mean and extreme multi-model climate change patterns in solar PV and wind energy potentials

Larsen,

Bournhonesque,

Thiery

et al. 2024

Environ. Res. Commun.

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Increasing renewable sources in the energy mix is essential to mitigate climate change, not least in countries where the energy demand is likely to rise over the coming decades to reduce or even skip durations of time where fossils dominate. For Africa, solar photovoltaic (PV) and inland wind energy, combined with hydropower, provide significant and untapped potentials, whereas trends and robustness measures need further investigation. This study aims to gain insight into distributed trends in solar PV and wind energy potentials over Africa. This study employs relevant metrics, including relative change, model agreement, robustness, bias, and absolute levels for every available model combination and two climate scenarios, with energy planning purposes in mind. The study finds that regional climate models were the primary control of spatio-temporal patterns over their driving global climate model. Solar PV potentials show more coherence between models, a lower bias and general high potentials in most African regions than wind potentials. Favourable locations for inland wind energy include mainly the regions of greater Sahara and the Horn region. For wind and solar potentials combined, scattered locations within Sahara stand out as the most favourable across scenarios and periods. The analysis of minimum energy potentials shows stable conditions despite low potentials in certain regions. The results demonstrate a potential for solar and wind power in most of the African regions and highlight why solar and wind power or synergies of energy mix should be considered for local energy planning and storage solutions.

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Towards a renewables-based future for West African States: A review of power systems planning approaches

Cited by 23 publications

References 78 publications

Modeling policy pathways to maximize renewable energy growth and investment in Democratic Republic of the Congo using OSeMOSYS

Modeling policy pathways to maximize renewable energy growth and investment in Democratic Republic of the Congo using OSeMOSYS

Juxtaposing Sub-Sahara Africa’s energy poverty and renewable energy potential

Renewable energy planning in Africa: robustness of mean and extreme multi-model climate change patterns in solar PV and wind energy potentials

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