Energizing Finance: Understanding the Landscape 2019

The report 'Energizing Finance: Understanding the Landscape 2019', produced by Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL) and Climate Policy Initiative, analyzes public and private finance commitments for electricity and clean cooking in 20 high-impact countries (HICs) from 2013 to 2017. It finds that while electricity finance reached a record high in 2017, it remains far below the levels required to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7) by 2030, particularly for residential users and in Sub-Saharan Africa. Clean cooking finance saw a severe decline in 2017, further widening the investment gap.

• Finance for electricity in the 20 high-impact countries (HICs) reached a record USD 36 billion in 2017, but only USD 12.6 billion (one-third) of this supported residential consumers. This is significantly below the estimated annual requirement of USD 51 billion needed to achieve universal household electricity access by 2030.
• Investment in clean cooking experienced a sharp decline, dropping 73 percent in 2017 to USD 32 million compared to the 2015-2016 annual average of USD 117 million. This is far below the estimated annual investment requirement of USD 4.4 billion.
• Sub-Saharan Africa remains severely under-invested. While total electricity finance for 13 analyzed African countries rose to USD 9.6 billion in 2017, this was largely due to a single USD 5 billion hydropower plant in Nigeria; four other countries in the region saw investment declines in 2017.
• Grid-connected renewable energy dominated electricity finance, accounting for 61 percent of all tracked finance in 2017, with India driving most of the solar PV investments. Conversely, investment in grid-connected fossil fuel plants decreased to USD 6.6 billion in 2017, with 60 percent of coal financing (USD 5.6 billion) coming from the Export-Import Banks of India and China for projects in Bangladesh.
• Off-grid solutions and mini-grids (OGS) represent a very small portion of electricity finance, totaling USD 430 million in 2017 (1.2 percent of total finance). Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda together accounted for 56 percent of these investments.
• International public finance for clean cooking reached a new low of USD 10.6 million in 2017, falling from 92 percent of all tracked finance in 2015-2016 to just 33 percent. In contrast, private finance for clean cooking increased to USD 21 million, representing 66 percent of the total tracked finance in 2017.
• Finance specifically targeted at women remains low; in 2017, only 7 percent of the USD 14 billion in annual official development assistance (ODA) for energy activities in developing countries was specifically targeted to benefit women.

APA

Climate Policy Initiative (2019). Energizing Finance: Understanding the Landscape 2019. https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/EF-2019-UL-ES-SEforALL.pdf

Chicago

Climate Policy Initiative. Energizing Finance: Understanding the Landscape 2019. 2019. https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/EF-2019-UL-ES-SEforALL.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Climate Policy Initiative |title=Energizing Finance: Understanding the Landscape 2019 |date=2019 |url=https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/EF-2019-UL-ES-SEforALL.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{climatepolicyinitiative2019energizing, author = {{Climate Policy Initiative}}, title = {{Energizing Finance: Understanding the Landscape 2019}}, institution = {Climate Policy Initiative}, year = {2019}, url = {https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/EF-2019-UL-ES-SEforALL.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }