‘Africa must set alternative energy agenda’

Africa must be bold and follow the examples of Brazil and Germany to plan an energy future around renewable and alternative sources, the head of the UN environment agency said on Thursday.

Many of the plans being considered by African governments, including huge hydropower dams and fossil fuel plants, were simply “more of the same”, UN Environment Programme executive director Achim Steiner told a development conference in Kenya.
Many would be able to supply the huge appetite of industry and city dwellers on the world’s poorest continent, he said, but they would “lock in” the rural majority to decades without power.

“We should not live with the dream of a trickle-down of energy supply (to villages) in 20 to 30 years time. Africa should not follow the technological path the rest of the world is willing to give it access to,” Steiner said.

Daily Times