How COMESA and the Alliance for Renewable Electrification are building a bankable pipeline for regional energy investment
The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and the Alliance for Renewable Electrification (ARE) have partnered to increase investment in renewable energy and expand access to reliable electricity across the region.
The two organizations signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in Brussels on September 24 during ARE’s Green Industrialization Days. The partnership aims to help renewable-energy projects move from early-stage ideas to projects that are ready for financing and construction.
Rather than supporting one specific power project, the partnership will focus on building a stronger pipeline of renewable-energy projects and addressing some of the challenges that often prevent projects from reaching financial close.
These challenges include limited feasibility studies, unclear regulations, weak revenue models, gaps in technical expertise and uncertainty over how risks should be shared between governments, developers and investors.
COMESA brings together 21 member states with a combined population of more than 640 million people, while ARE represents more than 170 renewable-energy companies operating across Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America.
Under the agreement, the organizations will develop joint research and knowledge products, organize training programmes and study tours, and create more opportunities for private-sector companies to contribute to energy policymaking.
They will also support renewable-energy developers in preparing projects for investment and connect developers with policymakers and potential investors through business matchmaking activities.
The partnership comes as countries in Eastern and Southern Africa continue to face significant gaps in electricity access. COMESA’s Regional Energy Access Acceleration Platform is working to expand both grid connections and distributed renewable-energy systems across the region.
The wider effort includes a target of supporting electricity connections for 100 million people, with a focus on areas where access remains limited.
COMESA and ARE said stronger project preparation will be critical to turning the region’s renewable-energy ambitions into actual investments. By bringing governments, developers and investors closer together, the two organizations hope to create projects that are better prepared to secure financing and move into construction.
The collaboration also builds on COMESA’s work under the World Bank-backed Accelerating Sustainable and Clean Energy Access Transformation (ASCENT) programme, which is designed to expand grid electrification, distributed renewable energy and clean cooking across Eastern and Southern Africa. It has a proposed $5 billion financing envelope and aims to leverage an additional $10 billion from public and private financing.
A key part of ASCENT is its Project Preparation Facility, which is intended to help governments and private companies develop bankable, investment-ready energy projects.
Furthermore, the latest agreement between COMESA and ARE is therefore less about announcing a single new power plant and more about creating the conditions for more renewable-energy projects to attract funding and reach implementation.
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