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Solar energy deployments dropped across the continent in 2020.
- In Subsaharan Africa sans South Africa, new solar additions were just 100MW.
- Gas led new generation capacity additions.
Solar energy deployment across Africa significantly reduced in 2020. In North Africa, new solar generation capacity additions reduced from 1.4GW in 2019 to just 36MW in 2020.
Read also: 821MW of New Wind capacity Installed in the Middle East and Africa in 2020
This reduction in deployments of solar was in part affected the Covid-19 pandemic. However, many believe the drop is indicative of a policy shift that has seen countries in the region increasingly adopt gas as a generation source, stifling the energy transition. According to African Energy MD John Hamilton, North Africa accounted for about 3.1 GW of new gas generation capacity of the 3.2 GW of gas added across the continent in 2020.
In Subsaharan Africa, gas dominated the new additions, ahead of hydropower with 911MW, Solar 842MW and Wind 829MW. According to African Energy Live Data, the rest of Subsaharan Africa added just 100MW of solar energy, except South Africa. The proportion of non-hydro renewables in the power mix rose across all of Africa except in the northern and eastern regions.