NAIROBI — Ensuring electricity reaches hard-to-access areas across the African continent is key to Sustainable Development Goal 7, which seeks to ensure affordable and clean energy access for all. But many mini-grid project developers find that when they connect last-mile populations with electricity — a highly capital-intensive enterprise — there is not enough demand for energy to justify the investment, according to panelists at the Future Energy East Africa conference this week in Nairobi.
Mini-grids are decentralized, small-scale energy units that generate electricity through various inputs — such as solar or wind — and supply it to a localized grid, usually in places that don’t make commercial sense for the national electrical utilities to serve, explained Rita Nkatha Laibuta, supervision consultant at the Green Mini Grid Facility Kenya.
While the price of a mini-grid ranging by size, one that serves about 200 homes might cost about $100,000 to install, she said.