The energy Africa needs to develop -- and fight climate change

In this perspective-shifting talk, energy researcher Rose M. Mutiso makes the case for prioritizing Africa's needs with what's left of the world's carbon budget, to foster growth and equitably achieve a smaller global carbon footprint.

Think about this.

Californians use more electricity
playing video games

than the entire country
of Senegal uses overall.

Also, before gyms
were shut down due to COVID,

New Yorkers could work out
in a 10-degree-Celsius gym

because the cold apparently
burns more calories.

And yet only three percent of Nigerians
have air conditioners.

As you can see, there's a mind-blowing gap

between the energy haves
and the energy have-nots.

And across the globe,
we have incredible energy inequality.

Billions of people simply lack
enough energy to build a better life:

affordable, abundant and reliable energy

to run their businesses
without daily blackouts,

to preserve their crops from rotting,

to power lifesaving medical equipment,

to work from home and do Zoom calls
with their colleagues,

to run trains and factories,

basically, to grow and to prosper

and to access both dignity
and opportunity.

Rich countries have that kind of energy,

whereas most countries in Africa,
and many elsewhere simply don't.

And those billions of people

are falling further and further behind
the rest of the world.

In addition to taking
their energy abundance for granted,

the wealthy take
something else for granted:

that everyone should fight climate change
exactly the same way.

Tackling climate change

will require an accelerated transition
to low-carbon energy sources.

And yet, emissions continue
to climb year after year,

threatening to blow
our tight carbon budget.

That's what I want to talk about today.

The carbon budget is an estimation
of the total emissions

that our planet's atmosphere
can safely absorb.

Faced with an imperative
to not explode this carbon budget,

the world is looking at Africa
in a completely contradictory way.

On one side, it wants us to grow,

to emerge from abject poverty,

to build a middle class,

to own cars and air conditioners
and other modern amenities

because after all,
Africa is the next global market.

On the other side,

because they are anxious
to demonstrate action on climate change,

rich countries in the West

are increasingly restricting their funding
to only renewable energy sources,

effectively telling Africa
and other poor nations

to either develop with no carbon

or to limit their development
ambitions altogether.

Africa obviously needs to develop.

That's non-negotiable.

And I want to make the case today
that Africa must be prioritized

when it comes to what's left
in the carbon budget.

In other words,

Africa must be allowed to, yes, produce
more carbon in the short term

so we can grow,

while the rich world needs
to drastically cut their emissions.

Africans have a right to aspire

to the same prosperity
that everyone else enjoys.

And we deserve the same chance at a job,

at an education,

at dignity and opportunity.

We also understand very well

that the entire world
needs to get to a zero-carbon future.

This might sound contradictory,
but consider these three points.

First, Africa isn't the culprit
of climate change.

It's a victim.

Africa and its more
than one billion people

are among the most vulnerable
to climate change on the planet,

facing the worst impacts
of extreme weather, drought and heat.

And yet, if you look
at the carbon footprint

of the entire African continent,

48 African countries combined

are responsible for less than one percent
of accumulative carbon dioxide

in the atmosphere.

Even if every one of the one billion
people in sub-Saharan Africa

tripled their electricity
consumption overnight,

and if all of that new power
came from natural gas-fired plants,

we estimate that the additional CO2
that Africa would add

would equal to just one percent
of total global emissions.

Second, Africa needs more energy
to fight climate change, not less.

Because of its climate vulnerability,

Africa's climate fight
is about adaptation and resilience,

and climate adaptation
is energy-intensive.

To respond to extreme weather,

Africans will need
more resilient infrastructure.

We're talking seawalls, highways,
safe buildings and more.

To cope with drought,

Africans will need pumped irrigation
for their agriculture,

and many will need desalination
for fresh water.

And to survive soaring temperatures,

Africans will need cold storage and ACs

in hundreds of millions of homes,

offices, warehouses, factories,
data centers and the like.

These are all energy-intensive activities.

If we fail at mitigation,

the rich countries' plan B
for climate change is to simply adapt.

Africans need and deserve
that same capacity for adaptation.

Third,

imposing mitigation on the world's poor
is widening economic inequality.

We're creating energy apartheid.

Working in global energy and development,

I often hear people say,

"Because of climate, we just can't afford
for everyone to live our lifestyles."

That viewpoint is worse than patronizing.

It's a form of racism,

and it's creating a two-tier,
global energy system

with energy abundance for the rich

and tiny solar lamps for Africans.

The global market for natural gas
is a great example of this.

Large Western companies
are actively developing gas fields

in African countries

to run industry and generate electricity
in Asia or in Europe.

And yet, when these same African countries
want to build power plants at home

to use gas for their own people,

the Western development
and finance communities say,

"No, we won't fund that."

And here's the irony.

Many poor countries
are already far ahead of the West

when it comes to transitioning
to a low-carbon energy system.

In Kenya, where I'm from, we generate
most of our electricity carbon-free.

Renewable sources
such as geothermal, hydro and wind

provide nearly 80 percent
of our electricity.

In the US, that figure is only 17 percent.

So let me repeat my points.

Everyone must get to a zero-carbon future.

In the transition,

Africa and other poor nations
deserve to get the balance

of what's remaining
in the world's carbon budget.

For economic competitiveness,

for climate adaptation,

for global stability

and for economic justice,

rich and high-emitting countries

must uphold their responsibility
to lead on decarbonization,

starting in their own economies.

We all have a collective responsibility
to turn the tide on climate change.

If we fail,

it won't be because Senegal or Kenya
or Benin or Mali decided to build

a handful of natural gas power plants

to provide economic opportunity
for their people.

Thank you.