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The SEforALL Forum will take place from 16-18 February 2021 in Kigali, Rwanda.

"Power in a pandemic" op-ed by CEO Damilola Ogunbiyi

On 31 March, an Op-Ed by Damilola Ogunbiyi called “Power in a pandemic - why energy access matters during coronavirus” was published by the Thompson Reuters Foundation News.

Ogunbiyi highlighted how energy is a critical input for any country’s emergency response plan, whether it’s for disseminating public health information or running medical equipment for treating those infected, among other uses. A lack of energy access will exacerbate the human cost of this crisis. She also explained how energy access is critical for restarting our economies once a public health threat has subsided.

Therefore, she outlined three measures related to the energy sector that the world should immediately act upon to mitigate the impacts of COVID-19:

1. Prioritize energy solutions to power health clinics and first responders
2. Keep vulnerable consumers connected
3. Increase reliable, uninterrupted and sufficient energy production in preparation for a more sustainable economic recovery

Estimating the COVID-19 impact to off-grid energy companies

Access to electricity keeps people connected, protects vulnerable populations, keeps ventilators on and saves lives. Off-grid companies are critical for reaching populations beyond the grid and for more rapid deployment of electricity solutions, for households and for health clinics. Yet, the current pandemic is disrupting their operations and threatening their ability to provide vital power.

Recognizing the critical role these businesses have in protecting vulnerable groups, SEforALL, in conjunction with partners, conducted outreach through surveys and questionnaires to establish a data-driven perspective on both the immediate impact of the pandemic on the mini-grid and solar home systems sectors as well as anticipated impacts related to the economic disruption. The data and information collected and analyzed will be critical to identifying the support and interventions that may be needed for the sector.

We surveyed over 80 Mini-Grid (MG) and Solar Home System (SHS) companies serving more than 1.9 million customers. We obtained data from GOGLA, AMDA as well as Smart Power India and interviewed more than a dozen Mini-Grid and Solar Home System companies to further complement the data.

Key findings of this survey.
 

Organizing a virtual event on off-grid sector impacts and solutions

The data and insights gained through our surveys and questionnaires were the basis for a virtual event on 16 April co-organized with The Rockefeller Foundation. The "Virtual High-Level Dialogue: COVID-19 Impact to and Solutions for the Off-Grid Sector" shared a data-driven perspective of the off-grid sector with an influential group of leaders from financial institutions, philanthropies, impact investors and donor organizations. The dialogue helped identify and initiate solutions to help ensure mini-grid developers and solar home system solution providers can survive and are able to ramp back up operations quickly once economic activities begin returning to normal.

Contributing to the UN’s Secretary-General's "Recover Better" strategy

SEforALL also provided input to the UN’s Secretary-General’s "Recover Better" strategy, which provides a vision for a recovery that leads to more inclusive and sustainable economies and societies that are more resilient in the face of pandemics, climate change and other global challenges, with our global roadmap remaining the 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals.

We outlined principles that should be applied to the energy sector, for both developed and developing countries, including on access to electricity and clean cooking, energy efficiency, and coal phase-out, among others.

Co-convening a technical webinar on managing utility operations during COVID-19

SEforALL was a co-convener for a technical webinar for electricity utilities called "Managing Utility Operations in the Context of COVID-19: The Enel Experience", presented by The Rockefeller Foundation and Enel Foundation. The webinar covered technical and operational best practices during the COVID-19 emergency, drawing on Enel’s experience in Italy and Spain, with a focus on energy infrastructure, resilience and local community protection.

Introducing a refreshed Powering Healthcare program

To respond to the immediate crisis and over the longer term, we are refreshing our work at the intersection of energy and health to reflect new challenges and to reiterate the importance of energy to healthcare.

In the short-term, to help with the COVID-19 response, SEforALL is working to coordinate the energy and health sectors to ensure that the power needs of health facilities and emergency health infrastructure are well understood and being met with appropriate energy solutions.

Our past research from Lasting Impact: Sustainable Off-Grid Solar Delivery Models to Power Health and Education will be valuable in informing our efforts helping governments and businesses with their COVID-19 responses. The long-term goal of our Powering Healthcare program is to accelerate the development and deployment of clean energy solutions in health facilities in order to create stronger and more resilient health systems in Africa and Asia.

To that end, SEforALL will:

• Build an investment case for powering healthcare to ensure access to adequate and reliable power in health facilities is prioritized as a necessary input to achieving public health and energy/climate goals.
• Create the core ‘building blocks’ for delivering distributed clean energy solutions to healthcare facilities at scale and in a sustainable manner. SEforALL is designing and leading this initiative and building a coalition of partners from the energy, health and development sectors to support it.

SEforALL will continue to build on the above activities and establish new ones as the COVID-19 situation evolves.

Photo credit: ADB

Switching Gears shows how cities like Arusha (Tanzania), Bacolod (Philippines), Dhulian (India), Gombe (Nigeria) or Port Elizabeth (South Africa) can put these solutions into practice.

Priority countries: Benin, Bolivia, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Nepal, Nigeria, Philippines, Senegal, South Africa, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia

2. Damilola Ogunbiyi named new CEO

2019 saw a change in SEforALL’s leadership as former CEO Rachel Kyte stepped down from her role at the end of September.

The SEforALL Administrative Board conducted a global search for a new leader, and on 29 October it was announced that Damilola Ogunbiyi will succeed Kyte as CEO and as the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Sustainable Energy for All and Co-Chair of UN-Energy.

Previously, Ogunbiyi was the Managing Director of the Nigerian Rural Electrification Agency (REA), where her work focused on mobilizing the stakeholders and finance needed for delivering energy access to people and communities that need it most.

Speaking about the appointment, António Mexia, Chairman of the SEforALL Administrative Board and CEO of Energias de Portugal (EDP), said “Damilola is the right leader at the right time. She has the experience, track record, and passion for sustainable development to catalyze progress, scale energy access, and lead SEforALL with ambition and impact.”

Ogunbiyi will take up these roles on 1 January 2020.

3. Marshalling evidence on energy access finance

For the third consecutive year, SEforALL published new research under its Energizing Finance research series. The series consists of in-depth primary research and analysis by SEforALL and partners that examines supply and demand for finance across two key areas of energy access: electricity and clean cooking.

Two reports were published this year, Understanding the Landscape 2019 and Taking the Pulse 2019, with both illuminating trends in financial commitments that can make or break SDG7 success. Understanding the Landscape 2019 showed how in 20 countries with the highest energy access deficits, tracked finance for residential electricity access was just a quarter of the estimated USD 51 billion required to meet universal access. Meanwhile, an annual investment of USD 4.4 billion is required to close clean cooking access gaps, yet only USD 32 million in finance commitments for clean cooking solutions were tracked.

SEforALL presented these findings at several key events throughout the fall, including the World Bank meetings and at COP25, using this evidence as an urgent call for action by financiers, governments and the private sector to invest in electricity and clean cooking.

4. UN Climate Action Summit

SEforALL was a co-lead on the Energy Transition Track at the 2019 UN Climate Action Summit, along with the governments of Ethiopia and Denmark and the UN Secretary-General’s Climate Action Summit Team.

As a co-lead, SEforALL helped organize the Energy Action Forum held the day prior to the summit. The Forum saw the launch of the Climate Investment Platform as a new global public good aiming to increase the flow of capital in developing countries to meet climate ambitions.

The following day, at the Climate Action Summit, SEforALL helped launch the Three Percent Club, which is a coalition of countries, businesses and institutions committed to a three percent annual global increase in energy efficiency across their economies and businesses, a target necessary to meet global climate goals while enhancing economic prosperity in all countries.

Additional initiatives supported by SEforALL and unveiled during the forum and summit included the Cool Coalition and the Getting to Zero Coalition.

5. Elevating sustainable cooling

In 2018, SEforALL published its first Chilling Prospects report detailing the scale and importance of the global cooling challenge: how to protect billions of people from rising temperatures while managing overall energy demands.

Since then, SEforALL has built huge momentum in bringing this issue to the forefront of the energy transition debate. In January 2019, SEforALL launched the Cooling for All Secretariat, which promotes awareness of the need for universal access to cooling, provide data and knowledge about the issue, and help coordinate focused responses. The Secretariat is guided by the Global Panel on Access to Cooling—a group of leaders from business, philanthropy, policy and academia.

SEforALL also produced Chilling Prospects: Tracking Sustainable Cooling for All 2019 to serve as a status update to the inaugural edition. As part of the update, the 2019 report introduced a Cooling for All Needs Assessment tool that allows governments, NGOs and development institutions to accurately size the market for cooling demands based on comfort, safety, nutrition and health needs.

6. Integrating efforts on SDGs

SEforALL consistently stresses the enabling role of sustainable energy for achieving other SDGs, including those on health, gender equality, climate, clean water and sanitation, and more. In 2019, we worked to integrate efforts on SDGs in a variety of ways.

In April, SEforALL co-published a report titled Lasting Impact: Sustainable Off-Grid Solar Delivery Models to Power Health and Education to help decision-makers in the public and private sectors design delivery models for reliable off-grid electrification projects for rural schools and health centers.

Keeping with the intersection of energy and health, this year’s Seven for 7 event, developed in partnership with Ashden, profiled seven leaders whose energy-focused work is improving the health and well-being of people in their communities.

The merger of the UN Foundation’s Energy Access Program into SEforALL in August was a keep step for strengthening our focus on these nexus issues by bringing over personnel dedicated to our Energy and Health, Energy for Displaced People, and Gender work.

7. New strategies for electrification

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 573 million people without electricity access. One of the major aims of our Electricity for All in Africa work is to help countries and regions develop new strategies for tackling their electricity access gaps.

As part of this effort, in June 2019 we published Integrated Electrification Pathways for Universal Access to Electrification: A Primer as a practical tool for facilitating government and private sector efforts to develop national electrification plans taking a full-systems approach.

Complementing the report was a series of videos illustrated the concept of Integrated Electrification Pathways, including three case studies for Ethiopia, Togo and Nepal, as well as a summary video, which you can watch below.

Prior to the release of the report and videos, SEforALL’s emphasis on integrated planning was already having an impact on policy. In April, Ministers from 39 African countries assembled for a meeting organized by the African Union Commission (AUC) in Cairo adopted a recommendation presented by SEforALL on integrated approaches to national electrification.

We look forward to building on these 2019 successes and working with both current and new partners on the push towards SDG7 in the year and decade to come.

Clean cooking finance

Finance for clean cooking was the central theme of a SEforALL-organized COP25 event called The Heat is On: Ingredients to Close the SDG7 Clean Cooking Finance Gap by 2030. Olivia Coldrey, Lead Finance Specialist at SEforALL, led a practical discussion involving government, implementation partners and think tanks on best practices in closing clean cooking access gaps and the related issue of increasing access to finance for women to purchase energy services.

During the SDG7 Roundtable organized by the Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action, António Mexia, Chair of SEforALL’s Administrative Board and CEO of EDP (Energias de Portugal), also highlighted urgency of addressing the clean cooking access gaps and stressed that, based on current projections, 2.7 billion people will still be without clean cooking solutions in 2030.

He called for consistent political commitment for sustainable energy—including an end to fossil fuel subsidies—long-term energy planning based on improved data and increased private funding for energy access as a roadmap for closing both clean cooking and electricity access gaps.