Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on contributors
- Peer reviewers
- Editor's note
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Preface
- Preface
- Preface
- Preface
- List of abbreviations
- List of SI prefixes
- List of unit abbreviations
- List of chemical formulae
- Part I Science
- Part II Sustainable energy development, mitigation and policy
- 10 Biomass energy in sub-Saharan Africa
- 11 Natural resources: population growth and sustainable development in Africa
- 12 Sustainable energy development and the Clean Development Mechanism: African priorities
- 13 Opportunities for clean energy in the SADC under the UNFCCC: the case for the electricity and transport sectors
- 14 Regional approaches to global climate change policy in sub-Saharan Africa
- 15 Energy for development: solar home systems in Africa and global carbon emissions
- 16 Climate change in sub-Saharan Africa: assumptions, realities and future investments
- 17 Climate-friendly energy policies for Egypt's sustainable development
- Part III Vulnerability and adaptation
- Part IV Capacity-building
- Part V Lessons from the Montreal Protocol
- Index
15 - Energy for development: solar home systems in Africa and global carbon emissions
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Notes on contributors
- Peer reviewers
- Editor's note
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Preface
- Preface
- Preface
- Preface
- List of abbreviations
- List of SI prefixes
- List of unit abbreviations
- List of chemical formulae
- Part I Science
- Part II Sustainable energy development, mitigation and policy
- 10 Biomass energy in sub-Saharan Africa
- 11 Natural resources: population growth and sustainable development in Africa
- 12 Sustainable energy development and the Clean Development Mechanism: African priorities
- 13 Opportunities for clean energy in the SADC under the UNFCCC: the case for the electricity and transport sectors
- 14 Regional approaches to global climate change policy in sub-Saharan Africa
- 15 Energy for development: solar home systems in Africa and global carbon emissions
- 16 Climate change in sub-Saharan Africa: assumptions, realities and future investments
- 17 Climate-friendly energy policies for Egypt's sustainable development
- Part III Vulnerability and adaptation
- Part IV Capacity-building
- Part V Lessons from the Montreal Protocol
- Index
Summary
Keywords
Renewables; market transformation; photovoltaics; solar home systems; buydown
Abstarct
A growing number of rural African households are using small solar home systems (SHS) to obtain better access to lighting, television and radio. Various non-governmental organizations, multilateral institutions and international aid agencies have catalysed these markets, partially motivated by a desire to reduce global carbon emissions. This chapter assesses the carbon mitigation potential of African SHS markets, concluding that direct carbon displacement will be limited. Indirect benefits from helping the global photovoltaics (PV) industry scale up production and bring down costs via the manufacturing experience curve will be larger, but still trivial relative to grid-connected markets. Nonetheless, by 2025 SHS could provide cost-effective basic electricity to a substantial share of rural households, and grid-connected PV could make an important contribution to overall electricity needs in Africa.
INTRODUCTION
The Kyoto Protocol under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) allows for the creation of a Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). Under the CDM, so-called ‘Annex’ countries that take on binding carbon abatement commitments may be able to partially comply by supporting initiatives that reduce greenhouse gas emissions in ‘non-Annex’ countries. Solar home systems (SHS) represent one possible arena for generating such trades of money and technology for abatement credits, and Africa is an important part of the current and potential market for SHS.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Climate Change and Africa , pp. 163 - 171Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005
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