The World Bank estimates that one billion people – of which a big fraction is in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia – have no access to electricity! Relatedly, the African Development Bank (ADB) explains that Sub-Saharan Africa cannot realise its development targets with current shortage of electricity stressing that the region needs USD 130-170 billion annually if it is to address its power challenges. Some experts argue that this presents a major barrier to social economic transformation touching major development indicators like health, education, poverty reduction, food production, gender equality, livelihoods among others.
Indeed, President Yoweri Museveni has often explained that “lack of infrastructure such as electricity” can impede development aspirations by among others causing high cost of doing business stating that lack of energy is one of major bottlenecks the continent is grappling with. Uganda’s Vision 2040’s whose aim is “A transformed Ugandan Society from a Peasant to a Modern and Prosperous Country within 30 years” undercores the importance of energy in any country’s social-economic development. The potential demand is seemingly growing with stretches from agriculture, manufacturing and domestic consumption. Digital infrastructure and innovation in the Power sector are meant to foster entrepreneurship but how do we achieve this at the earliest times anyway?
With several sources of power such as Nuclear, thermal, biomass, solar and hydro, supply is ceasing to be a challenge for Uganda’s dream but rather demand triggered in-terms of load growth, electricity access and quality of service mapped against the cost of electricity. The Grid development plan (2018-2040) indicates growth in sales by UETCL of 9% partly due to exportation of electricity to neighboring countries like Kenya. Nonetheless, the demand side in Uganda has continued to portray potential in the next future thus the need to match it to supply.
Global energy targets have also continued to be enforced especially through donations, grants and Foreign Domestic Investments (FDIs) calling for compliance to conditions such as affordable and clean energy which is number 7 priority of United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 7) and number SDG number 13 – climate action with notable environmental regulations especially those relating to green energy and reduction of carbon emissions for example the use of electric vehicles that are eco-friendly. This has fronted Technology as a feasible solution to solve power issues globally like never before for which Uganda should not be indifferent.
China is already playing a key role especially in supporting energy infrastructure development especially in Africa and the entire global south. China’s Belt and Road initiative (BRI) is one of main vehicles Beijing has been using to fund and support energy infrastructure development including Uganda’s Karuma and Isimba hydropower stations. Also, through Chinese State-Owned firms, Beijing’s role in ensuring global transformation of the power sector is very visible and commendable. China Southern Power Grid (CSG) , a state-owned enterprise that operates in China’s five provinces including Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Guizhou, and Hainan has demonstrated digital AI plus power systems (Green) in Hainan province with low carbon development at 28% energy usage in China. With these targets of sustainability, renewables are becoming irreplaceable thus the need to attract an interdisciplinary approach of integration.
With demand, system stability is seen to be the biggest challenge however with appropriate planning parameters and investment in climate friendly portfolios and products, these can guarantee reliable and resilient power systems, for example replacing generators and inverters with converters.
Uganda’s electricity problems are largely associated with accessibility, reliability and energy losses some of which are underpinned to vandalism. Investment in digital infrastructure such as drones that have an AI inbuilt mechanism can be used for smart monitoring of both transmission and distribution network lines especially in the highly risk areas like the North-eastern part of Uganda (Karamoja region) that is prone to insecurity thus threatening the safety of staff operators.
The path of investment in Technology has seen CSG become a performance benchmark in China with its power reliability hitting nearly 100%, accessibility stands at 100% with sufficient energy storage to beat outages, cost of power has dropped by 60% in the past decade due to the pricing mechanism that is market established among the 38 OECD countries. This has stimulated economic growth and social benefits including improved competitiveness with China’s scale increasing from 11 trillion yuan in 2012 to over 50 trillion yuan in 2022. It is imperative to associate such achievements to be driven by market demand, technological innovation and government support.
On 9th December 2024, CSG launched the implementation of a new power system to achieve cleanliness and low carbon emissions of power supply by 2035. This is to have a composition of Wind PV, hydro, nuclear and hydrogen as renewables are becoming a more reliable substitute for fossil fuels. Safety and sufficiency being pre-requisites, development is meant to advance in-tandem to enhance reliability with
They built a back-up power supply coordinating the large power grids to the distributed smart grids guaranteeing a stable electricity system operation. Cost effectiveness and efficiency being key, the electricity tariff will further decline due to the improved electricity market mechanism increasing terminal energy consumption to 42% by 2035. This demonstrates synergy between supply and demand with foundations from flexibility and intelligence thus optimizing source grid integration. If the different energy sector players in Uganda (ERA, UEGCL, UETCL, UEDCL) through the ministry of Energy explored such opportunities of technology advancements, Uganda could become among the first developing countries to witness the benefits of the new power supply system gradually by 2035. With UMEME out, maybe Uganda and Africa in general should borrow a leaf from China’s CSG. The company has already helped a number of countries such as Vietnam, Chile, Peru, Laos and Luxenberg among others to significantly improve their power supply by significantly reducing power losses in process of distribution among others through use of advanced technology.
The writer is a Research Fellow at the Development watch Centre.