Priorities for renewable energy investment in fragile states

In brief:

  • State fragility is strongly linked to prevalent climate hazards and poor energy access. Conflict, poverty, and poor governance increase countries’ vulnerability to climate change threats, while access to electricity – especially renewable – is lowest in fragile settings.

  • Four key factors make the scaling of renewable energy investment in fragile and conflict-affected states desirable and relevant: cost and practicality, increased and secured energy access, economic resilience, and inclusion and empowerment.

Meeting water demand in growing cities: a PPP project in Sudan

Significant increases in investment and improvements in management capacity are required to meet the demand for infrastructure services in the rapidly growing cities of low- and middle-income countries. Closing the infrastructure financing gap requires both public and private finance. Sudan has long experienced under-investment in potable water infrastructure, and access to clean drinking water in fast-growing Khartoum is inadequate.

ADB Helps PNG Expand Port Moresby International Airport Using PPP

The project will use a PPP scheme where the private sector will design, build, finance, operate, and maintain the airport facilities. A new international passenger terminal, the extension of the main runway, and other infrastructure enhancements will help the airport meet forecast air services growth up to 2040. The concession period and other parameters will be determined based on the feasibility study.

PPP – N4 Toll Concession

The N4 was financed through a combination of equity finance by the private partner, plus loan finance from a range of the major financial houses in the sub-continent – primarily from South Africa. A percentage of the finance was also provided by the Development Bank of South Africa and a mine workers pension fund. Both governments agreed to underwrite or guarantee the debt in case of TRAC’s inability to service the loan.

N4 Toll Road from South Africa to Mozambique

South Africa has an important experience in PPP projects, involving about 300 such projects on the national and provincial levels since 1994. The South African National Treasury, the body that deals with PPP projects, developed a PPP Manual to guide projects of this nature. The manual defines a PPP to be a contract between a public sector institution and a private party, in which the private party assumes substantial financial, technical and operational risk in the design, financing, building and operation of a project.

N4 Toll Route

The case study describes the N4 Toll Road Project, a brownfield toll road concession of 630 km running from Pretoria, South Africa’s administrative capital, to Maputo, the capital of Mozambique and a deep-sea port on the Indian Ocean. The project was structured as a public-private partnership (PPP) between the governments of South Africa and Mozambique and a private consortium for a 30-year period. The project is the first cross-border transport PPP project in Sub-Saharan Africa and the first brownfield PPP of this scale in South Africa.

Case Studies in Private Sector Participation: Solid Waste Management

Two case studies discuss the impacts of public–private partnership contracts in the solid waste management services. The case study in Papua New Guinea draws on the National Capital District Commission (NCDC)'s experience with contracting rubbish collection to the private sector, and underscores the importance of robust and transparent procedures for tendering and contracting. In the case study in Fiji, green waste collection in Suva has been outsourced for over 25& years, but household waste collection has never been outsourced.

The Tuvalu Solar Power Project

The report describes an e8-funded small-scale solar power system project in Tuvalu together with lessons learned and success factors. The e8 comprises of 10 leading electricity companies from the G8 countries promoting sustainable energy development through electricity sector projects and human capacity building activities in developing nations worldwide. The project was inaugurated on February 21, 2008 and intends to decrease reliance on fuel and to enhance renewable energy-based electrification in the small island state of Tuvalu. Tuvalu is one of the places