The World Bank has approved $311 million in International Development Association (IDA) financing for the new Regional Emergency Solar Power Intervention Project (RESPITE) for West African countries.
According to the bank, existing and prospective electricity customers in Chad, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Togo will benefit from the project.
It said in a statement that the new project includes a $20 million grant to help facilitate future regional power trade and strengthen the institutional and technical capacities of the West Africa Power Pool (WAPP) to undertake its regional mandate.
SDG Seven: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
The statement read, ‘The main objective of the RESPITE is to rapidly increase grid-connected renewable energy capacity and strengthen regional integration in the participating countries’.
‘It will finance the installation and operation of approximately 106 megawatts of solar photovoltaic with battery energy and storage systems, 41 megawatts expansion of hydroelectric capacity, and will support electricity distribution and transmission interventions across the four countries’.
Data from the bank reveals that West Africa has one of the lowest rates of electricity access in the world; only about 42 percent of the total population and 8 percent of rural residents have access to electricity.
The data also reveal that in West and Central Africa, only three countries are on track to give every one of their citizens access to electricity by 2030.
‘Among others, it will provide fiscal space for countries to address food crisis resulting from the war in Ukraine, initiate development of competitively tendered grid-connected clean energy to alleviate current power supply crisis, positively address climate change by helping countries to move away from expensive and polluting fuels, and help synchronize the WAPP network to enhance regional integration in the energy sector’, World Bank Task Team Leader, Rhonda Jordan-Antoine, said.
In addition to improving the reliability of electricity supply in each of the beneficiary countries, the project has developed a regional approach to enhance the potential of power trade in West Africa.
Source: World Bank
Photo source: USAID
