- for Off-Grid Renewable Energy projects in Africa’s Fragile States
The African Development Bank Group’s (AFDB) Board of Directors has approved a $5.65 million reimbursable grant from the Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA) to pilot the Peace Renewable Energy Certificate (P-REC) Aggregation Facility, a pioneering initiative that will, for the first time, deploy renewable energy certificates as a direct funding instrument for a portfolio of mini-grids across Africa’s most fragile and energy-poor countries.
Co-financed with the Nordic Development Fund, which committed an equivalent of $5.65 million, the $11.3 million facility will be managed by Camco Clean Energy, a climate and impact fund manager, and Energy Peace Partners, a US-registered non-profit that developed the Peace Renewable Energy Certificate label. The certificates come exclusively from small-scale mini-grid projects in conflict-affected and energy-poor communities, and are voluntarily purchased by multinationals looking to put their corporate sustainability spending where it drives the greatest social and environmental impact.
The facility will enter into long-term purchase agreements with qualifying mini-grid developers across 14 frontier countries—Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, and Uganda. It will provide developers with upfront cash payments in ex- change for the rights to the certificates produced by the project. The facility will subsequently sell those certificates to global corporate buyers, channelling hard currency back to developers in markets where commercial financing is very limited.
Some 856,000 people across these 14 countries are expected to gain first-time access to reliable electricity as a result, roughly half of them women, through approximately 240,000 new connections and 71 megawatts of new renewable energy capacity.
The project is fully aligned with Mission 300, the joint African Development Bank and World Bank initiative to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030. NDF is contributing to the ambitious energy access targets of Mission 300 through their sizable renewable energy portfolio and as a member of the Development Partner Coordination Group.
“Lack of access to capital for rural electrification continues to be a major hurdle for universal energy access in the African continent, particularly in countries experiencing conflicts and fragility. I am proud that SEFA is backing this innovative, first-of-a-kind facility testing a new climate finance product capable of unlocking new sources of commercial funding for private sector led mini-grids. This is the kind of market-making needed to advance Mission 300 objectives.” João Duarte Cunha, Manager, Renewable Energy Funds Division and Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa, African Development Bank Group
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