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Four Key Challenges Facing India’s Local Energy Enterprises During COVID-19 – And 16 Ways Funders Can Help
COVID-19 has had a devastating impact on last-mile energy companies. SELCO Foundation recently conducted surveys and conversations with 33 local Indian energy enterprises about the challenges they're facing. Sarah Alexander explores what these businesses shared about how governments, investors, philanthropies and other stakeholders can support them.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Energy, Finance, Social Enterprise
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Press Release: Efficiency for Access Design Challenge Celebrates University Students Promoting Clean Energy Access in Emerging Economies
Winning teams from Kenya, Uganda and the UK have been announced at the Efficiency for Access Design Challenge Grand Final.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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The Impact of COVID-19 as Seen in Solar Payment Data – and How One Off-Grid Energy Company is Responding
Since COVID-19 began, the energy company Bboxx has been monitoring payment trends among its 250,000+ pay-as-you-go solar customers in 12 emerging markets. Analysts at Bboxx assess the data from four African countries, exploring what it says about the pandemic's impact on solar electricity users – and about how to support these customers during the crisis.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Energy
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Scaling Cleaner Cooking Solutions in East Africa: Acumen Discusses Its Kopagas Exit
This is not just a problem of the inconvenience of outdated technology, but of health: more than 4 million people—the majority of whom are women and girls—die each year from exposure to the air pollution produced by cooking with open fires in their homes. That’s more than the number of deaths each year from malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS combined.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Renewable Energy Is Electrifying COVID-19 Isolation Centers in Nigeria
The COVID-19 pandemic has upturned our 21st century existence, wreaking havoc on both social and cultural norms and our way of life. It has also crippled the global economy and continues to impact diverse business sectors and industries — travel, transportation, education, and manufacturing.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Energy, Environment, Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Agency Banking and Off-Grid Energy: Banking the Unbanked Through Solar
In rural Africa, off-grid renewable energy products are gaining momentum - but their upfront cost can make them inaccessible to low-income customers. Commercial banks have struggled to penetrate these markets, but Thelma Obiakor at the Centre for the Study of the Economies of Africa explains that this is now changing. Thanks to agency banking, financial services and solar companies are providing a bridge to both energy access and greater financial inclusion.
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Keeping the Lights On: How PAYGo Solar Can Offer Customer Relief During COVID-19
Off-grid solar delivers essential energy to millions of people, helping make households, business and institutions more resilient to the COVID-19 crisis. But as analysts at BFA, CGAP and GOGLA explain, the pandemic threatens the industry, particularly its very successful pay-as-you-go business model. They explore how companies could enable customers to continue using their solar home systems during the pandemic, with reduced – or even without – customer payments.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Energy
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From the Fringe to the Center: Assessing the State of the Off-Grid Appliance Market in 2020
Energy access is about much more than connecting households to the grid, or getting them a rooftop solar panel. People also need access to life-changing appliances. But as Jenny Corry Smith at CLASP and Michael Tsan at Dalberg Advisors explain, these appliances still aren't reaching many households in rural sub-Saharan Africa. They share key insights from the new State of the Off-grid Appliance Market Report on how the sector can address this growing priority.
- Categories
- Energy
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