The Senior Energy Specialist, World Bank, Mr. Arsh Sharma, yesterday, said Nigeria has the largest energy deficit on the continent, noting that, over 90 million people are not connected to the national grid.
Sharma stated this at a conference tagged: “Unlocking opportunities for clean and sustainable energy” during the closing ceremony of the 2020 Ehingbeti Summit in Lagos.
According to him, “There is no other country other than Nigeria that is having that kind of energy crisis. Nigeria has over 90 million people without access to electricity. This is the largest energy deficit in the whole of Africa which is imperative for all of the development bank partners to come together to support the Nigerian government efforts both at the federal and state levels.”
He said, on the part of the World Bank, it has commenced a rural electrification project to improve access of electricity to rural dwellers in the country.
The project, he said, has provided over 100,000 jobs and has impacted the lives of 4 million Nigerians, noting that, the initial target of the programme was to target 450,000 households, but stated that the scheme has surpassed the target in terms of impact.
“Our intention is to triple the ambition going forward. We started engaging with the Lagos State government and we did a viable analysis for distributed PV because there exist a much untapped potentials for the marketing of PV solar systems. We have been offering technical assistance to the state and we will support the state to implement the plans they have made up in the PV solar space,” he stated.
Also speaking, the commissioner,Lagos State Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources, Olalere Odusote, said, solar is the most vibrant sector in the country because of the large players that exist in the solar industry, saying, the state has set a target of 1 Gigawatt of solar power by 2030 in Lagos.
He added that to achieve this, there has to be a significant mobilisation of capital to achieve the feat.
He also added that the State is partnering with Discos to set up light houses in specific areas the state can intervene to improve power supply in a cost effective basis.
State government, he said, is also planning to separate the Lagos State grid from the national grid such that whenever there is a grid collapse, Lagos would not be affected.
The managing director, FCMB, Yemi Edun, said renewable energy has come to stay, pointing out the need for strong collaborations between the private and public sectors to drive renewable energy in the country.
She added that, FCMB has identified key sector areas to achieve the rapid development of renewable energy in the country, stressing that, the federal government does not have the capacity to provide power supply to the 40 per cent of the population that are not on national grid.
She said the bank has so far provided loans of over $6 billion in the past four years to drive solar energy development in the country.
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