Africa

In a project that the World Bank hopes will be a catalyst for implementing its climate change strategy in low and middle-income countries, Eskom, South Africa’s 100% state-owned electricity utility, will launch a tender for a 1.4 gigawatt-hours battery energy storage system (“BESS”). The tender will likely be issued in the first or second quarter of 2020, pending final governmental approval. The completed BESS will have a daily capacity of 1.4 gigawatt-hours of energy output (which is sufficient energy to power 1.4 million homes for an hour). The project is the first of its kind on the African continent.
Continue Reading South Africa Prepares for a Battery Energy Storage System Tender

The African continent is revolutionizing itself as the place where no infrastructure is no problem.  This began in the telecommunications field:  Africa lacks a robust system of landlines, which traditionally enable better access to desktop computers, online services, and financial institutions.  But the emergence of cellular telephony has allowed individuals across Africa to bypass…

After months of speculation and mounting pressure, it’s finally here: the government of Nigeria has released the long-awaited PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) forensic audit of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), the country’s national oil company. It’s not often that the release of a highly technical accounting report makes the headlines—much less grabs the attention of…

The new year may only be a few months old, but 2015 has already ushered in a number of exciting developments in the solar power space in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Solar projects coming online across the continent and more in the pipeline. Riding the momentum of 2014 in which it brought online the largest photovoltaic (PV)…

Last week, London-based firm EnergyNet held its “Powering Africa Summit” in Washington.  The Summit, opened by U.S. Secretary of Energy Moniz, attracted project developers, equipment suppliers, financiers, the U.S. Government’s Power Africa team, and African government officials.  Unfortunately, due to the African Union Summit that was being held at the same time in Ethiopia, no…

As foreign investment into Sub-Saharan Africa continues to grow, inevitably, so does the risk of disputes arising between commercial parties. The potential benefits of arbitration in settling a commercial dispute, including procedural flexibility and neutrality, are well known (read more from the ICC here). This post provides an introduction to the relevance of…