The Clean Energy Hub of the Future | Rebekah Shirley | TED

Africa is perhaps the continent that needs least convincing

about the clean energy opportunity

for health, livelihoods and economy.

As the fastest-growing, yet least-electrified continent on the globe

most in need of power systems that can help fortify

against the onslaught of climate shocks

and with both abundant fossil

and renewable energy resources to build them,

Africa's energy transitions

and how to dissuade the use of fossil fuels

have become an intense international debate.

But what the debates often miss is that Africa is not a single story.

As an energy systems modeler,

I can tell you that though the baseline is low,

where they do have power,

many Sub-Saharan African countries already rely on low-carbon resources.

Kenya, where I live,

generates 90 percent of its power from renewables

like geothermal and hydropower.

Even in West Africa,

where renewable shares tend to be lower,

countries like Ghana generate over a third of their power

from renewable energy resources.

And countries like Namibia are at the forefront of innovation

on clean fuels like green hydrogen.

Couple all of that with housing one of the world's largest carbon sinks,

the Congo Basin,

and Sub-Saharan Africa is consistently recognized

as pulling more than its fair share of the global decarbonization effort.

So unlike the deep emissions reductions,

and urgent pivot away from fossil fuels we need to see from heavy emitters,

Sub-Saharan Africa and energy transitions

are more a question of how to quickly ramp up generation

and distribution capacities

in ways that are affordable, accessible, resilient,

while staying the course of climate compatibility.

So if the need is urgent and if the resources are bountiful,

then why are we still so far away from this clean energy future for Africa?

I've led the design and deployment of energy projects here myself.

And I found and what I've learned

is that though the world loves to remind Africa

about its vast clean energy potential,

the financial flows to deliver that potential

remain troublingly scarce.

Projects and businesses incur a number of hidden compounding costs and premiums.

Like the risk perception premium.

Or the “paying back your US dollar loan

in a constantly depreciating local currency” premium.

Or the “expected to deliver conventionally high rates of return

while raising your revenues from customers

that earn less than a dollar a day” premium.

So international finance markets are not appetized

and financial flows here remain a trickle

despite a pipeline of ready projects.

Effectively, this prioritizes risk to capital

over risk to human life.

In fact, though, 17 percent of the global population

and almost 90 percent of those still without access to basic energy,

today, Africa accounts for a mere two percent

of global clean energy finance.

These realities of local enterprise rarely make it into the models

or the debates,

leaving us with a skewed perception of what transition really takes

or why progress might seem so slow.

From this perspective, we can see a key missing ingredient:

International cooperation to deliver the finance flows

that Africa sorely needs

because there’s so much potential waiting right at the cusp.

If local enterprise had access to long-term, low-cost financing,

like their counterparts in other regions of the world

can simply take for granted,

then Africa's clean energy future would build itself.

We know this because African communities,

by their actions,

show us the kinds of futures that they want.

As our cushioned conferences wax on year after year,

my friend Jeffrey runs a solar company

that targets commercial and industrial customers,

helping to kick-start what has become the fastest growing wave

of solar across the continent.

And also demonstrating that African businesses

see value in being powered by renewables.

My neighborhood buddy, Samir, runs a solar irrigation company.

It's estimated that about 95 percent of farmers in Africa

still rely entirely on increasingly erratic rains.

So this is a game changer for food security.

My former student, Phoebe,

she now designs fuel-efficient cook stoves

that reach into thousands of homes

from Zambia to Mozambique,

providing sustainable alternatives

to what is actually the largest energy use on the continent,

household cooking.

And at the World Resources Institute,

we support dozens of young Rwandan,

Ugandan and Kenyan electric mobility start-ups

that are revolutionizing the face of transit in East Africa.

These are real people, real stories, real families

representing a real wave of local enterprise,

successfully serving communities across an entire spectrum of energy needs.

These are real salaries, real rents, real mortgages,

real savings being put on the line every day.

Is that not the utmost confidence

in Africa's clean energy business potential?

Imagine how fast we could go and how far we could move

if they had a level playing field instead of yet more obstacles to climb.

And if they can be invested,

then what excuse remains for those with the means and the responsibility?

Africa is speaking.

But it's not one story.

It's not even 54 stories.

It's the stories of thousands of communities

mobilizing the features they want

and inviting the world's partnership in it.

Partnership.

Not charity, not a victim song,

but fairness and cooperation.

Ambitious, time-bound commitments

to deliver long-term, low cost financing at scale

from countries, banks and development finance institutions.

Two, increased concessional financing, not reclassified financing,

that doesn’t just target the easily profitable projects,

but that is leveraged to drive global capital to least-electrified communities.

And three.

Programs that expand the access to that finance

and initiatives that bolster local supply chains,

generating value, revenues,

employment and skills at home.

These are the solutions

that the international community must make an urgent priority,

even as African countries do their own homework

to improve the local business environment.

And this, delivering accessible, clean energy financing at scale

will be a far more productive show of partnership and trust

than debating what countries should do with their available resources.

Climate justice is heavy emitters cooperating

to realize clean energy futures

for those countries that have been denied,

locked out of their fair share of a global carbon budget.

So today, let's cut past the talk

and focus on unleashing the avalanche of a clean-energy future

that Africa is ready to deliver.

Thank you.

(Cheers and applause)