Find out about recent activities and the up-coming events where Power for All will be profiling decentralized renewables—and get involved!
June Highlights: Access Dividend, India and more
Power for All, in partnership with SEforALL, has launched the development of the Energy Access Dividend. This framework will enable decision-makers to assess the affordability, cost-effectiveness and impact of energy access solutions, incorporating the value of time, and answering the question: What social and economic benefits are gained from early access to energy, when communities and households don’t have to wait 7-9 years for the grid to come? The Overseas Development Institute (ODI) is leading the data gathering and developing an approach to the underlying methodology and framework design, with inputs from a broad range of stakeholders, including DFID, the World Bank, Acumen, GOGLA and Power for All’s research team. Stay tuned, as the Energy Access Dividend project begins to bring clarity to the value of distributed renewable energy solutions in delivering the SDGs.
In India, Power for All has kicked off work to help align DRE sector messaging and narrative, curate supporting evidence, and tell the amazing stories of the companies, individuals, CSOs and others advancing the DRE sector in a country with 269.8 million unelectrified. Working closely with the CLEAN Network and other key actors, we have established a communications secretariat, developed a sector messaging guide, and started to implement a communications strategy. As part of a desire to “own the narrative”, we created a Medium.com channel - “Powering Rural India: a Chronicle of India’s Quest to Electricity 269.8 Million Rural Poor”. Readership is strong and growing, so please follow the channel to receive updates. At the same time, we started global media outreach, with some highlights including a Reuters story on Simpa Network’s new Magic TV service, and an interview on CNBC Africa regarding increased collaboration between India and Africa in DRE. We also worked with several sector leaders to respond to a recent negative report in The Economist, and will be continuing to engage media on both a proactive and reactive basis.
Our Sierra Leone and Nigeria campaign leaders have also been representing market activation work globally. Ami Dumbuya attended the Women Entrepreneurs and Sustainable Energy in Africa workshop held in Gabon, held on the back of the African Ministerial Conference on Environment (AMCEN), where over 75 women entrepreneurs in sustainable energy across the continent participated. She presented during the Access to Finance working group session, developing recommendations to address the prevailing challenges on the issue of finance for women. Meanwhile, Ify Malo attended the AE4H Innovation Lab: Accelerating Energy Access Solutions Forum held at the institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies in Potsdam, Germany where over 50 leading thinkers from research institutions, the private and public sector, and NGO and finance organizations across the continent participated. The forum was focused on developing practical ideas to empower participants to drive solutions in the energy access challenge space.
Inside Nigeria, congratulations are in order to the Power for All campaign team, which has been named recipient of the 2nd edition of the Nigerian Green Economy Award, in recognition of the benefits the campaign brings to the DRE space in Nigeria. This award is given annually by the Sustainable Energy Practitioners of Nigeria (SEPAN)in collaboration with Global Legislators Organization for a Balanced Environment (GLOBE) to honor deserving Nigerians and businesses who are contributing substantively towards entrenching development advocacy initiatives and sustainable clean energy in Nigeria.
Launch of the Ajima Farms Waste-to-Watts project
Power for All, in collaboration with USAID Power Africa and other stakeholders in the renewable energy sector, paid a courtesy visit to the newly appointed management of the Rural Electrification Agency (REA). The visit was to set a pace for partnership dialogue with REA to streamline donor and development partner investment and support towards operationalizing the rural electrification master plan and Rural Electrification Fund. Power For All is will be supporting and working closely with REA to integrate DRE into its work and facilitating action-oriented collaborations between the REA and other stakeholders. The Nigeria team also attended the launch of the Ajima Farms Waste-to-Watts project, an off-grid electricity project in rural community Rije, in Kuje Area Council of Abuja supported by the United States African Development Foundation (USADF). The project provides clean water and biogas cooking fuel produced from locally sourced agricultural waste. Ajima Farms is one of Power For All’s many industry partners in Nigeria.
July: Campaign Events Calendar
Paris, 12 July: Identifying Technology Innovation Needs and Opportunities: Off-Grid Access to Electricity
Deputy director for advocacy Aaron Leopold will attend this stakeholder workshop hosted by IEA with Mission Innovation, which will focus on identifying R&D gaps and opportunities regarding off-grid access to electricity and serve to highlight successful existing projects, allow participants to share best practices. It will also see to build further consensus on priority actions, discuss targets and possible metrics to measure progress against implementation and identify stakeholders for the implementation of innovative solutions and products.