African leaders and campaigners are at odds over the way forward for the continent as a critical climate summit begins in Nairobi.
Some countries, such as Ethiopia, Kenya, Egypt and South Africa, have been expanding their renewable energy access and leading transition efforts on the continent, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency.
Africa has abundant renewable energy potential, solar power is the cheapest source of energy in most African countries, and as the costs associated with renewables fall, green energy access is becoming more accessible, say energy experts.
But African nations with large oil and natural gas reserves – such as Nigeria, an oil-producing country where reserves, regulators believe, will last a few more decades, and Senegal, which has made significant oil and gas discoveries in recent years – argue they should be able to use those resources for economic growth and increased energy access.
Other countries such as Namibia are straddling a middle ground, attracting significant investment in renewable energy while exploring the potential of oilfields off its coast over the last few years.
The continent is responsible for less than 4% of emissions and with 600 million people across the continent without access to electricity and an expected rise in demand, debate has grown over the last decade on what a “just energy transition” for the continent would entail.
Climate campaigners, who convened a peaceful climate march in Nairobi on Monday, say new investments in fossil fuels across the continent set an alarming trend. “We are marching for ambitious renewable energy targets and an end to fossil fuels,” said Hardi Yakubu, of the advocacy network Africans Rising.
Wangari Muchiri, the Africa director at the Global Wind Energy Council, said debates around gas could stall critical discussions on what it would take for the continent to undergo “green industrialisation”, such as increased investments in renewables and building the continent’s renewable energy manufacturing capacity.
Campaigners believe a fossil fuel phaseout should be on the summit’s agenda. With the dash for gas in Senegal and projects such as the East African crude oil pipeline, Yakubu said, there was no sign of a slowdown.
The Africa Climate Summit, hosted by Kenya and the African Union Commission, brings together several African heads of state and government, ministers and UN leaders, including the UN secretary general, António Guterres, and his predecessor Ban Ki-moon.
The conference, centred around “green growth and climate finance”, will drive discussions on energy transitions on the continent and barriers to access as countries increasingly question whether African countries, which are generally not saddled with fossil fuel infrastructure, can skip past the traditional high carbon pathways taken by their industrialised counterparts, into renewable energy.
On Wednesday, a joint declaration will outline the continent’s position on climate finance and green growth. “No country should ever have to choose between development aspirations and climate action,” reads the Nairobi declaration, seen by the Guardian.
The declaration will contain proposals for the establishment of a global carbon tax system that leaders say will increase the availability of climate finance and incentivise countries to cut emissions and call for industrialised countries to accelerate their efforts to reduce emissions, keep their 2009 pledge to provide $100bn in annual climate finance, which has not been met, and to operationalise the loss and damage fund agreed on during Cop27 last year.
“Our renewable energy resources … can uplift millions from energy poverty, all while reducing our carbon footprint, continentally and globally,” the Kenyan president, William Ruto, said at the conference opening.
Discussion will also be focused on the Africa Carbon Markets Initiative (ACMI), launched during Cop27 in an effort to expand carbon offsetting activities on the continent, which aims to produce 300m carbon credits annually by 2030 and unlock $6bn (£4.75bn) in revenue by 2030 and more than $120bn (£95bn) by 2050. Leaders see it as a way to unlock much-needed climate financing.
Gabon was the first country on the continent to receive a payout in 2019 for reducing emissions. The densely forested central African country, one of the most carbon-positive nations in the world, will receive more than £119m over 10 years. Leaders say the industry has massive export potential for the continent. At the conference, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) committed to buying $450 million of carbon credits from the ACMI.
But climate organisations and campaigners have pushed back on carbon market plans, labelling the markets a “dangerous distraction” and a “false solution”, and expressing scepticism over whether carbon offset projects can result in meaningful climate funding and sustainable development, or address the climate crisis.
“There is no room for the illusion of offsets in a world where we have exhausted the remaining carbon budget,” said Mohamed Adow, the director of the climate thinktank Power Shift Africa. “The very design of these markets is for us to proffer pollution permits to wealthy industrialised countries and companies, locking them into a high emissions pathway and shifting the burden to African people. It’s actually a new form of colonialism.”
