Namibia is the best performing African country to make a successful energy transition. This is contained in the World Economic Forum’s Energy Transition Index 2020 released on Wednesday, May 13.
The report summarizes insights from the “Energy Transition Index” (ETI), which builds upon the previous series of “Global Energy Architecture Performance Index” by adding a forward looking element of country readiness for energy transition.
According to the Fostering Effective Energy Transition report, Nambia has an ETI score of 53,6%, system performance of 54% and transition readiness stands at 53%.
Ghana follows with 53.2% ETI, system performance of 59% and transition readiness of 47%.
The index ranks South Africa 106 out of 115 countries, improving nine places over the past 12 months. The countries are benchmarked on the performance of their energy systems and their readiness for transition to secure, sustainable, affordable and inclusive systems.
Kenya is 79th and rated 54% prepared to make the switch while Zambia and Botswana are ranked 98th and 99th respectively.
Nigeria is the least prepared African country, ranking 113th, one place above Cameroon. Nigeria, the continent’s largest economy, is 35% prepared to make the transition while Cameroon which the report ranks 114th is 42% ready.
In the report, the WEF also warned that the coronavirus pandemic risks cancelling out recent progress in transitioning to clean energy, with unprecedented falls in demand, price volatility and pressure to quickly mitigate socioeconomic costs placing the near-term trajectory of the transition in doubt.
According to the report, economic development and growth dimension of energy transition is currently being challenged by the cascading effects of Covid-19.
Sweden (1) leads the ETI for the third consecutive year, followed by Switzerland (2) and Finland (3). France (8) and United Kingdom (7) are the only G20 countries in the top 10.
Meanwhile, the trend has been moderately positive in Germany (20), Japan (22) and South Korea (48) and Russia (80).
On the other hand, scores for Canada (28), Chile (29), Lebanon (114), Malaysia (38), and Turkey (67) have declined since 2015. The United States ranks outside the top 25% for the first time, primarily due to the uncertain regulatory outlook for energy transition.