On 16 & 17 February 2023, national and regional experts on energy and finance gathered in Dinokeng Nature Reserve (Gauteng, South Africa) to take part in a meeting of the Green Grids Initiative Africa Working Group (GGIA). Countries represented in the meeting included Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, and South Africa (Eksom), as well as representatives of the GGI Steering Committee from the United Kingdom. The Working Group meeting operated in parallel to a series of meetings of the Climate Parliament on green grids, energy planning, as well as clean cooking.
The working group meeting discussed support mechanisms for the Zimbabwe-Zambia-Botswana-Namibia (ZiZaBoNa) regional transmission project, alongside other projects, and complementary support available through the Green Grids Initiative (GGI) Ecosystem.
The sessions were designed to enable working group members and key stakeholders in the region to:
Reflect on the progress made on ZiZaBoNa so far, across a range of political, financial and technical areas, Address the energy access and connectivity requirements across the region as a whole, to deep dive into next steps and develop a collective work programme on ZiZaBoNa for 2023, and to build political will and engage relevant stakeholders in the initiative and projects, including regional, national and local institutions, developers, financiers and members of parliament. Overall, substantial progress was made on ZiZaBoNa, with a clear set of outcomes and actions agreed by participants.
The GGI Africa Working Group: The GGIA forms part of the GGI Ecosystem of regional and thematic working groups and partners driving forward the core aims of the initiative as outlined in the One Sun Declaration. It has been active since August 2021 and is led by the African Development Bank (AfDB). The GGIA seeks to accelerate the development of resilient transmission grids, which enable the large-scale integration of renewable energy generation in support of sustainable development and the global transition to clean power, building on existing transmission grid integration initiatives on the African continent.