Africa’s low-carbon future?
To meet the projected tripling of electricity demands of the African region by 2030, many, if not all, international transmission projects are currently planned around large hydropower and coal plants. Although it is cheaper and cleaner, the current contribution of wind and solar energy to each power pool remains below 1%.
Grace Wu and Ranjit Deskmukh, who are affiliated with the University of California, Berkeley, USA, address this gap in their new study that was published in PNAS, along with a team of researchers, including Tijana Radojicic, at the International Renewable Energy Agency in the United Arab Emirates.
The study advocates strategic siting and regional interconnections to meet the increasing electricity demands of the African region. Wu, Deskmukh, and colleagues characterized and valued wind and solar electricity resources for 21 countries in Eastern and Southern Africa, including Egypt.
Read the full article by Lakshini Mendis via Nature Middle East.
[Photo by Gigi Ibrahim | Flickr]
