Top 4 Data Insights on West Africa’s Clean Energy Sector
We’ve just launched the latest in a series of reports on Alternative Finance in Emerging Markets!
This month we look at clean energy and green tech in West Africa, following the successful launch of the Ghana Climate Innovation Centre Investor Database — a unique directory of all alternative capital providers active in the clean technology space in Ghana. In this blog, we look at some of the key data and charts from our Capital Finder database on the financing of green tech companies and projects in the 10 West African countries selected for our report analysis.
Public financial flows to renewable energy projects in these 10 countries averaged $1.23 billion each year from 2009 to 2017 (IRENA, 2018 data). The above chart shows the average public flows in contrast with the respective number of capital providers for each country. Nigeria boasts an estimated 150 funders active in the clean tech sector, the largest number in the region. Togo, where we estimate 20 active investors, has the smallest amount.
Our Capital Finder database is highly searchable and allows us to analyze investors by category. This chart summarises this data for renewable energy and clean-tech investors in West African countries, indicating that impact investors are the prevailing source of finance in the sector by number of funders across all 10 countries, with public and semi-public investors coming in a close second. Overall, angel investor networks are the least prevalent provider type for the industry.
Grants, equity investments, and loans each entail different business implications. This chart shows us the number of funders by country according to the capital type provided. Across all 6 countries included here, equity is the most established form of financing on offer.
The Capital Finder also contains information on past deals; this deepens our understanding of investors’ portfolios and how much funding firms in the sector are receiving. The above chart shows the average minimum and maximum deal sizes in the West African clean energy market by capital type. Disaggregating the data in this way enables entrepreneurs to have an idea of which investors to approach for their own projects.
The report also features an in-depth interview with Wale Shonibare, Acting Vice-President of Power, Energy, Climate Change & Green Growth at the African Development Bank, who provides his thoughts on the clean tech sector across the region.
Read the full report here!
