African leaders at a regional energy summit in Tanzania this week called for more investment in aging grid infrastructure in their countries to tackle widespread power outages that hamper major economies including Nigeria and South Africa, and to expand modern energy access to half of the 600 million people who lack it on the continent.
The conference was organised by Mission 300, an initiative launched in April 2024 by the African Development Bank and the World Bank to provide 300 million energy-poor Africans with electricity by 2030. This will be done mainly by connecting them to national grids or local minigrids powered by renewables such as solar.
The development banks have committed to collectively deliver $40 billion under the initiative – a target that was raised this week to more than $50 billion by contributions from other financial institutions, including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) with around $1.5 billion and the Islamic Development Bank Group with $2.65 billion.
To meet the Mission 300 goals, a first batch of 12 countries – Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania and Zambia – presented national energy compacts with detailed targets to scale up electricity access through renewable energy, as well as strategies to boost regional integration and attract private sector investment.
Presenting their plans, African leaders spoke of how outdated infrastructure has limited energy expansion on the continent and held back development in areas like healthcare, education, job creation and digital inclusion.
President Hakainde Hichilema of Zambia said African countries “need energy to develop our economies faster,” adding that “energy is life – as is water”- and energy is essential to extract water for human consumption, agriculture and industry, and keep people healthy.
He pointed to the need for a diversified energy mix coming from different sources including solar, hydro and geothermal, and emphasised that the power they generate must also be transmitted. “We need to take it where it’s needed,” he said.
Other countries echoed a similar concern in their energy compacts. Nigeria’s plan, for instance, stated that “the ability of the transmission system to evacuate available generation capacity is inadequate due to aging and poorly maintained infrastructure”. It called for “targeted concessionary lending to qualifying distribution companies (DISCOs) to strengthen distribution infrastructure”.
Tanzania also mentioned in its compact that the country’s electricity connections are faced with the challenge of “poor reliability and quality of service, caused by a deteriorating network with overloaded transformers [and] distribution feeders”. It called for improvements in the quality of the electricity service that “require investments in grid stabilization, network rehabilitation, reinforcement, and upgrades”.
African leaders at the Mission 300 energy summit (Photo: AfDB)
Makhtar Diop, managing director of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), noted that “a lot of the power outages in Africa are not linked often to production – they are often linked to distribution because the [electricity] network is not robust enough” and called for investments in distribution.
The companies managing distribution require capital injections because most are “under-capitalised and not in a good finance situation and therefore not able to invest in operational maintenance”, he added.
Meanwhile, the progress of some countries like Uganda shows that grid improvement and extension to improve distribution is achievable. With World Bank support, the country extended its grid and installed solar energy in health centres and water supply schemes, directly benefiting almost 8.8 million people in rural areas between 2016 and 2023. It has now embarked on another such project, involving the private sector.
Off-grid ‘cheaper and faster’
Off-grid electrification is also seen as key to the Mission 300 objective – and the energy compacts presented in Dar es Salaam reflected how, in the face of delays to grid extensions, distributed renewable energy (DRE) offers a faster means to electrify under-served communities.
Half of the Mission 300 goal is due to be achieved by off-grid connections. World Bank President Ajay Banga said geo-spatial mapping was being used within countries to decide which areas can be connected to the grid and which require DRE, including solar and battery storage systems that are “cheaper and faster” to install.
Coal-reliant South African provinces falling behind on just transition
Woochong Um, CEO of the Global Energy Alliance for People and Plant (GEAPP), said this group of government agencies, development banks and philanthropic foundations, is looking to support “hard-to-reach activities, like the productive use of the electrons by the farmers and people on the ground”. GEAPP is planning to pilot promising models that can be scaled up by banks if they produce successful results, he told Climate Home.
Sarah Malm, executive director of GOGLA, a global association for the off-grid solar industry, said off-grid systems “will complement weak grid environments” as the “least-cost and the fastest way to get basic energy access to households”, especially in rural communities.
“It provides light to study. It provides safety. It provides the ability for a kiosk to stay open at night. It provides really huge quality of life improvements – and then also, when light is intermittent and the grid doesn’t work, it is a source of back-up,” she said.
From 2020 to 2022, off-grid solar accounted for 55% of new connections in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the World Bank, and is projected to provide electricity access to nearly 400 million people by 2030.
Malm believes that off-grid solar is the best way to achieve the global goal of providing everybody with modern, sustainable power by 2030, because extending power grids is a long-term investment and progresses more slowly.
Private-sector investment
African leaders and energy backers at the summit highlighted the role of private-sector investment in fulfilling the goals of Mission 300.
“To actually achieve what we want to do, it requires more than public-sector money, it requires a lot of private sector,” said Akinwumi Adesina, president of the African Development Bank Group. He added that the private sector will play a role in delivering mini-grids and providing electricity to under-served areas.
Indonesia’s next priority should be finding alternatives to replace coal
The cost of capital, however, is one of the major challenges facing businesses in Africa. Mission 300’s partners will “play a big role to reduce the risk using partial risk and credit guarantees” and provide long-term, low-interest capital, as well as develop bankable projects to attract private investors, Adesina said.
Um told Climate Home that GEAPP will work with multilateral development banks to help governments set up regulatory frameworks that can reassure the private sector their investments in African countries are safe.
Diop of IFC said the private sector is not yet as involved as it should be in financing clean energy development in Africa and this has constrained the uptake of renewable energy. He called for a “change in the paradigm” to catalyse heavy investment in renewables.
(Reporting by Vivian Chime; editing by Megan Rowling)
The post African leaders seek investments in ailing grid infrastructure to achieve energy goals appeared first on Climate Home News.
African leaders seek investments in ailing grid infrastructure to achieve energy goals
Fifty-six years after the first one rallied 20 million people across America, “we need to do things that make us feel more powerful.”
From our collaborating partner Living on Earth, public radio’s environmental news magazine, an interview by host Steve Curwood with environmental historian Adam Rome.
It was the second defeat for the Trump administration’s unusual litigation to stop states from acting on climate change.
In a setback to the Trump administration’s extraordinary legal campaign against state climate action, a federal judge threw out the Justice Department’s lawsuit seeking to prevent the state of Hawaii from suing oil companies for damages.
Judge Dismisses Trump Administration’s Bid to Block Hawaii Climate Lawsuit
Climate Change
DeBriefed 17 April 2026: Fossil-fuel power slumps | ‘Super’ El Niño warning | Afghanistan’s climate struggle
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Oil prices rebound
OIL UP AGAIN: Oil prices surged by more than 7% and back above $100 a barrel on Monday after US-Iran peace talks faltered and US president Donald Trump ordered the blockading of Iranian ports, reported BBC News. The jump came after prices fell last week in the wake of the announcement of a conditional two-week ceasefire, it said.
RESCUE PLANS: European countries unveiled plans to protect citizens and businesses from rising energy prices. Ireland announced a support package worth €505m, reported BBC News, while Germany agreed on measures worth €1.6bn, said Bloomberg. Meanwhile, Reuters reported on a draft EU proposal due to be unveiled next week that would see the bloc reduce electricity prices and roll out clean energy more quickly in response to the crisis.
UNSOLICITED ADVICE: Trump renewed his criticism of UK energy policy and called on the government to “drill, baby drill”, reported the Independent. Via social media, the president said: “Europe is desperate for energy, and yet the United Kingdom refuses to open North Sea oil, one of the greatest fields in the world. Tragic!!!” (See Carbon Brief’s recent factcheck of various false claims about the North Sea.)
Around the world
- C-WORD: Faced with pressure from the US, countries attending spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank were urged to “not mention the climate”, reported the Guardian. It added that plans to agree a new “climate change action plan” for the World Bank “may be shelved, along with substantive discussion of the climate crisis”.
- NEW DIRECTION: Péter Magyar’s landslide victory over Victor Orbán in Hungary’s elections “presents new opportunities for the country to reduce emissions and invest in clean energy”, reported Time. Carbon Brief explored what it means for European climate action.
- ‘FURNACE’ SUMMER: There was widespread coverage – including in the Boston Globe, ABC News, CNN, Euro Weekly News, Guardian and New Scientist – of warnings from meteorologists of the development of a “super” El Niño phenomenon that could ramp up temperatures and drive extreme weather.
- ANTALYA COP: The Turkish government unveiled the dates and venues for the “leaders’ summit” segment of November’s COP31 conference, according to Climate Home News.
- PACIFIC PRE-COP: Meanwhile, the Guardian reported that Tuvalu will host a special meeting of world leaders before the climate summit in Antalya.
€10bn a year
The amount of state support that French prime minister Sébastien Lecornu has pledged for electrification through to 2030 in a bid to reduce the country’s dependence on fossil fuels. In a speech late on Friday 10 April, Lecornu noted the figure amounted to a “doubling” of existing support.
Latest climate research
- Over a four-month period of 2023, more than 70% of editorials discussing net-zero in four right-leaning UK newspapers included “at least one misleading statement” | Climate Policy
- Air pollution from global transport currently has a net cooling effect that offsets 80% of the warming impact of the sector’s CO2 emissions | npj Climate and Atmospheric Science
- The incorporation of “observational constraints” into climate-model projections suggests that the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation could weaken by 50% by 2100 in a medium-emissions scenario | Science Advances
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Analysis by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) found that global electricity generation from fossil fuels fell in the first month of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Across all countries with real-time electricity data outside of China, coal-fired power generation fell 3.5% and gas-fired power generation fell 4.0%, according to CREA. This was offset by a rise in solar power and wind generation, which increased by 14% and 8%, respectively. Hydropower generation also saw a small increase, the analysis showed, but this was “more than offset” by a drop in nuclear power generation.
Spotlight
How climate change affects Afghan lives
This week, Carbon Brief reports on the impact of climate change in Afghanistan, following deadly floods this year.
Earlier this month, heavy rains, flash floods and landslides struck large parts of Afghanistan, damaging thousands of homes, destroying crops, bridges and roads and taking nearly 100 lives.
The flooding – reported to have affected 74,000 people in 31 of 34 provinces – is the latest weather-related catastrophe to afflict the nation, whose communities have suffered the brunt of repeated flash floods, droughts and landslides in recent years.
Hameed Hakimi, non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center, told Carbon Brief the recent floods would hurt livelihoods and food security, noting reports of destroyed wheat and rice crops in the most affected eastern parts of the country. He said:
“This is common. For at least a decade now, [we have seen] these flash floodings and the damage that happens to rural life, farming, the disruption to crops…Flash flooding physically eats up the land. So, it not only damages where people live, but also people’s livelihoods, based on what they grow.”
The damage to crops will be felt acutely, he explained, given that food security in the landlocked nation is already strained by the blockage of its main transit trade artery through Pakistan and international sanctions that have frozen long-term development aid.
Speaking to Carbon Brief, Abdulhadi Achakzai, founding CEO of the Environmental Protection Trainings and Development Organization (EPTDO), an Afghan NGO, described flooding in Afghanistan as a “chronic situation”.
Achakzai, whose organisation runs projects that help urban and rural communities adapt to climate impacts, says climate change hurts the country in four key ways: extreme drought; extreme temperature; “natural hazards”, including landslides and dust storms; and, finally, flash flooding. He said:
“Climate change is a serious matter in Afghanistan. Every nation and every corner within this country is severely affected.”
Ranked 176 of 187 on the University of Notre Dame “global adaptation index”, Afghanistan is among the countries most vulnerable to climate change.
Average temperature across the country has increased from 12.2C in 1960 to 14.2C in 2024, according to the World Bank’s climate change knowledge portal. Drought is widespread, severe and persistent – harming food and water security in a nation of subsistence farmers.
Meanwhile, extreme weather events are the leading driver of internal displacement in the country. More than three-quarters of the 710,000 people who relocated within Afghanistan in 2024 did so driven by “environmental hazards”, such as drought and flood, according to a recent climate vulnerability assessment from the International Organization for Migration.
Finance struggles
Despite feeling the impacts of extreme weather, Afghanistan has been barred from UN climate negotiations and had limited access to climate finance since 2021. (The government attended COP29 in Baku as guests of the Azerbaijan hosts, but did not take part in formal negotiations.)
This is because the international community does not recognise the Taliban government, which resumed power in 2021, due to its record on human rights and its repression of women and girls in particular.
Almost all financing from key climate funds has been suspended, with the exception of a few projects where UN agencies and NGOs act simultaneously as a “requesting” and “implementation” partner.
Aid from UN climate funds fell from $5.9m annually over 2014-20 to $3.9m annually over 2021-24, according to recent analysis by the Berghof Foundation. Multilateral development banks provided a further $337m of funds badged as “climate finance” over 2021-23, it said.
By comparison, Afghanistan’s national climate plan, submitted to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 2016, requested $17.4bn in climate finance over 2020-30. An updated national climate plan seen by Carbon Brief – completed in 2021 and later endorsed by the Taliban government, but not accepted by member governments of the UNFCCC – called for $20.6bn through to 2030.
Achakzai, whose organisation attends the COP climate summit each year in an observer capacity, has in the past been the sole delegate from Afghanistan to the conference.
He is calling on the UNFCCC to accept the country’s latest climate plan – and to find an “alternative solution” that would give the people of the country a voice in negotiations. He said:
“Every year we are losing hundreds, thousands of people because of climate change-related matters. Every year we are losing hundreds, thousands of hectares of crops. We are affected by [the decisions of] other countries. Why are we not part of this process?”
Watch, read, listen
BLOSSOM WATCHER: The Guardian reported on the successful search to find a researcher to continue Japan’s 1,200-year cherry blossom record.
COP OUT: Deutsche Welle spoke to experts to understand why India walked away from its bid to host COP33 in 2028.
‘BOMBS AND PORN’: The New Republic looked at who is set to benefit from the rapid build-out of energy-intensive AI datacentres.
Coming up
- 20-24 April: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) working group one report author meeting, Santiago, Chile
- 22 April: Earth day
- 22 April: Launch of third edition of the Lancet Countdown’s Europe report
- 24-29 April: First conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels, Santa Marta, Colombia
Pick of the jobs
- International Organization for Migration, senior thematic associate (climate action) | Salary: UN G-6 salary grade | Location: Dakar, Senegal
- Climate Action Network UK, several board member roles | Salary: Unknown. Location: Unknown
- UK Department for Energy, Food and Rural Affairs, G7 science lead | Salary: £56,375. Location: Bristol, London, Newcastle-upon-Tyne or York, UK
- Save the Children UK, senior climate change advisor | Salary: £62,000-£65,000. Location: London
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 17 April 2026: Fossil-fuel power slumps | ‘Super’ El Niño warning | Afghanistan’s climate struggle appeared first on Carbon Brief.
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