Discover Insights

Here are some key findings from our analysis of the data on health facility electrification initiatives and implementation projects around the world:

Total number of initiatives by country 

The top four countries in terms of the number of completed, ongoing and planned healthcare initiatives, are in Sub-Saharan Africa. Leading this list is Nigeria with 44 initiatives, but these do not cover all the health facilities that need to be electrified. This indicates that while the country’s health facility electrification landscape is crowded with many initiatives, there is still scope for more to be launched to electrify the remaining health facilities and achieve 100 percent electrification.  

In comparison, India is fifth on the list with only 13 initiatives, but these cover many more health facilities that are electrified/being electrified, thus showing a market dominated by a small number of players.  

This shows that a high number of initiatives does not mean all health facilities are being electrified. As such each country and case is different, depending on a variety of market factors. 

Total number of health facilities electrified by country 

 
India has by far the largest number of health facilities electrified/being electrified at 25,663, followed by Tanzania with 3,260 facilities. This difference points to both the effort and investment going into electrifying health facilities but also the size of the country and consequently the large number of health facilities that need to be electrified.  

Total number of initiatives by status of engagement and size of system 

The trend of installing larger system sizes continues. Of the completed initiatives, approximately 60 percent had systems of over 1 kWp capacity. In comparison, most of the ongoing initiatives and all of the planned ones are over 1 kWp. This shows that the ambition is to utilize larger systems that will increase the electrification impact, not just of individual health services or the main facilities, but also at a facility-wide scale (e.g. including staff quarters). 

Types of solutions deployed 

As with previous years, the technology type category is topped by stand-alone solar PV, at 69 percent, which has been the dominant technology since 2018. Though interestingly, in the last year, grid connections have risen from 9 to 17 percent, making it the second most deployed type of solution. This indicates that the national grid continues to expand at a rapid pace, particularly in certain countries and regions. 

There has been a reduction in the number of community-wide mini-grids that connect a health facility, likely because health facilities may be located far enough from a community to warrant a stand-alone system instead. Another reason could be the difficult economics of including a health facility with a low ability-to-pay in an already complicated mini-grid market. 

Types of initiatives 

In 2023, as in the previous year, the supply of power solutions was the most common type of initiative, accounting for over 28 percent of all initiatives. Health facility feasibility studies and then mapping/needs assessment follow next, at 23 percent and 20 percent respectively. This indicates a growing interest in understanding the energy needs of specific facilities, countries or regions, which can then be used for funding decisions. 

Types of health facilities electrified 

Primary healthcare centres were the most dominant type of health facilities (27 percent) covered under different initiatives in 2023. This has been the dominant type since 2018, though numbers have dropped in recent years. 

These are followed by district/referral hospitals (24 percent) and community clinics (22 percent). This shows that smaller health facilities that provide life-saving health services – particularly critical in remote areas – are still the most targeted in implementation activities. This is also in line with the fact that generally non-hospital services have lower electrification rates than hospital facilities. However, the increase in the number of district/referral hospitals electrified in the last year also shows that larger facilities are still in need of better electrification especially from an energy reliability perspective