Grant-makers, donors, impact investors and development financiers must combine to leverage the $33 billion funding that energy enterprises require to meet Africa’s basic energy needs by 2030. Larger, more agile “blended” finance vehicles – providing early-stage funding at the right time at the right scale – are needed to enable this. The Portuguese city of…
SF’s partnership with Open Capital Advisors is helping off-grid enterprises in Uganda access local debt finance, public partnerships to serve low-income households and international support to enhance energy for productive use. Download the 2018 market map (PDF 1.2MB).
Decentralised renewable power generation and distribution systems such as mini-grids, are important tools for providing power to the roughly 600 million Africans currently living without access to modern energy services. For African Governments to meet the Sustainable Energy for All Goal of Universal Access to Energy By 2030, it is estimated that 40 percent of…
Shell Foundation provides patient grant funding and extensive support to our social enterprise partners with the objectives of creating maximum impact and making those enterprises financially viable. Husk Power Systems’ recent announcement of commercial investment from Shell Technology Ventures LLC, Swedish development finance institution Swedfund International and ENGIE Rassembleurs d’Energies, ENGIE group’s impact investment fund,…
Two recent additions to the SF portfolio are using innovative technology and business models to deliver increased and improved access to energy in Africa, including into some new and challenging markets. SF is supporting BBOXX and Aceleron as part of our strategic partnerships with the UK Government and USAID, which aim to create and scale…
By Charlie Nichols and Samir Ibrahim, Co-Founders of SunCulture Four out of five African families depend on agriculture for their livelihoods, yet just four percent use irrigation with the rest relying on increasingly unreliable rainfall. We know that switching to irrigated agriculture can increase yields by up to 90 percent when compared to nearby rain-fed…
SF is working with Value for Women to present the business case of gender inclusion strategies for SMEs in the off-grid energy sector. The lessons emerging, based on the first 11 months of testing approaches of SF’s portfolio of enterprises explore the potential impact to businesses, including: How SMEs can integrate and adopt gender inclusion…
Energy storage has become a key issue for the solar industry. SF is working with the Grantham Institute at Imperial College, London, on a report exploring solutions for off-grid energy organisations, looking at technology choices, challenges and opportunities. Here we share the initial findings on technology availability and supply chains, realised costs of storage solutions,…
Shell Foundation has supported M-KOPA since 2011 to establish its solar and mobile technology solution and to provide affordable, clean and bright energy to off-grid villages in East Africa. In 2016, M-KOPA Labs was established to accelerate the company’s ability to produce innovative, larger capacity appliances capable of interfacing with off-grid energy. In developing new…
Shell Foundation and Catalyst Off-Grid Advisors try to get a realistic idea of the quantum and type of capital needed to reach the off-grid component of Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG 7) in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), defined as all households with at least a large portable system or a solar home system. Read the report…