Sustainability, inclusiveness and governance of mini-grids in Africa (SIGMA)

由于世界上约有10亿人无法用上电，要实现到2030年实现普遍电气化的目标，只需进行社会技术变革即可。撒哈拉以南非洲有6亿多人用不上电，需要给予特别关注。尽管离网和分散的解决方案预计将发挥重要作用，迷你电网被认为是全球快速、具成本效益、有利于穷人的普遍电气化的游戏规则改变者，但绿色迷你电网行业并未迅速增长。各国之间和国家内部、农村地区和非正规城市住区以及高收入和低收入社区之间的进展参差不齐。在非洲，扩大微型电网规模的障碍包括缺乏特定于微型电网的监管框架、未经证实的商业模式、需求不确定性、融资渠道有限以及缺乏能力。这项建议的主要目的是通过建立更完善的证据基础和对问题和挑战的多层面认识，提高我们对微型电网，特别是撒哈拉以南非洲微型电网的可持续性、包容性和治理的了解，以支持更好地为全球普及电气化作出更好的决策。该项目是通过一个由驻英国的研究人员和来自撒哈拉以南非洲四个国家(即尼日利亚、塞内加尔、肯尼亚和坦桑尼亚)的研究团队参与的合作过程来构思的。我们确定了四个主要的研究问题。1)哪些商业模式成功地在SSA提供了在财务和技术上可行的迷你电网？2)在案例研究国家中，谁以及什么是迷你电网的主要受益者？以何种方式？3)谁推动或阻碍了东非和西非迷你电网的普及和采用的速度？4)每个案例研究国家存在哪些分散电力供应系统的治理、监管和政策框架，它们有多成功，它们有什么不同？我们的分析方法处于人文地理学、发展研究、工程学和可持续性过渡的交叉点。研究必须是跨学科的，以了解金融、技术、政治、社会经济和文化因素之间的复杂相互作用。我们计划制定一个政治经济框架和一个可持续发展框架，以分析发展中国家的电力供应情况，特别是微型电网。我们的案例研究(两个来自西非、尼日利亚和塞内加尔，两个来自东非、肯尼亚和坦桑尼亚)提供了引人入胜的比较理由，并根据它们不同的治理模式以及在各自特定的国家和地方背景下分散电力供应的不同水平而被选择。这项工作分为七个工作包，将在36个月内交付。我们将对有关微型电网、可持续性、治理、政治经济学和包容性的文献进行广泛的审查(WP1)。我们计划在这项任务结束时制定我们的分析框架。在WP2中，我们将通过收集有关微型网格的相关信息，并为我们研究的四个国家开发一个微型网格数据库，专注于建立证据基础。然后，该数据库将用于分析每个案例研究国家的微型电网状况。工作组3、4和5致力于分析微型电网的可持续性、包容性和治理。这将在每个国家一级进行，也将在跨国比较一级进行。WP6致力于交流、传播和产生影响的活动，而WP7致力于项目管理。该提案的新颖性在于其基于证据的方法，以发现微型电网的挑战，并为成功的企业制定可持续和包容性的战略。

With approximately one billion people lacking access to electricity in the world, nothing short of a socio-technical transformation is required to reach the objectives of universal electrification by 2030. Sub-Saharan Africa, with more than 600 million lacking access to electricity, requires a special attention. Although off-grid and decentralised solutions are expected to play a significant role and mini-grids are assumed to be a game changer for a rapid, cost-effective, pro-poor, universal electrification globally, the green mini-grid sector has not grown rapidly. Progress has been patchy between and within countries, across rural areas and informal urban settlements and between high and low-income communities. Among the barriers to scaling up mini-grids in Africa are lack of mini-grid specific regulatory framework, unproven business models, demand uncertainty, limited access to finance and lack of capacity. The main aim of this proposal is to improve our understanding of sustainability, inclusiveness and governance of mini-grids in general and those in sub-Saharan Africa in particular, by developing an improved evidence base and a multi-dimensional appreciation of issues and challenges that can support better decision-making for universal electrification globally. The project has been conceptualised through a collaborative process involving a team of UK-based researchers and research teams from four sub-Saharan Africa countries (namely Nigeria, Senegal, Kenya and Tanzania). We have identified four main research questions. 1) Which business models have succeeded to deliver financially and technically viable mini-grids in SSA? 2) Who and what have been the key beneficiaries of mini-grids in the case study countries and in what way? 3) Who drives or hinders the proliferation and the speed of adoption of mini-grids in East and West Africa? 4) What governance, regulatory and policy frameworks for decentralised systems of electricity provision exist in each case study country, how successful have they been and how do they differ?Our analytical approach sits at the intersection of human geography, development studies, engineering and sustainability transitions. The research is necessarily inter-disciplinary in order to understand complex interactions between financial, technological, political, socio-economic and cultural factors. We plan to develop a political economy framework and a sustainability framework to analyse electricity access in developing countries, with a particular focus on mini-grids. Our case studies (two from West Africa, Nigeria and Senegal and two from East Africa, Kenya and Tanzania) present fascinating grounds for comparison and have been selected on the basis of their diversity of governance models and differing levels of decentralised electricity provisions within their specific national and sub-national contexts. The work is organised in seven work packages and will be delivered over a period of 36 months. We would undertake an extensive review of literature on mini-grids, sustainability, governance, political economy and inclusiveness covering (WP1). We plan to develop our analytical frameworks at the end of this task. In WP2, we would focus on building the evidence base by collecting relevant information on mini-grids and developing a mini-grids database for four countries of our study. The database will then be used to analyse the status of mini-grids in each case study country. WP 3, 4 and 5 are devoted to analysis of sustainability, inclusiveness and governance of mini-grids. This will be done at the level of each country and also at cross-country comparative level. WP6 is devoted to communication, dissemination and impact generation activities while WP7 is devoted to project management. The novelty of the proposal lies in its evidence-based approach to uncover challenges of mini-grids and to develop strategies for successful businesses that are sustainable and inclusive.