Enhancing the climate resilience of Africa’s water and energy infrastructure

The Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) used the Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) system and the Open Source Energy Modeling System (OSeMOSYS) to model climate change impacts on seven strategic river basins in Sub-Saharan Africa. The analysis found that all basins face significant economic risks, with the Niger River potentially facing costs up to $200 billion and the Zambezi River showing the highest uncertainty with impacts between $50 billion and $125 billion. To mitigate these risks, SEI recommends that policy-makers integrate climate change expertise into infrastructure planning through technical guidelines, open-data repositories, and professional training programs.

• Seven major river basins in Sub-Saharan Africa—the Congo, Orange, Niger, Nile, Senegal, Volta, and Zambezi—are strategically critical, collectively accounting for approximately 200 GW of hydropower capacity and possessing the potential to increase irrigation capacity by over 60%.
• Climate change presents substantial economic risks to infrastructure across all analyzed basins. The Niger River is identified as having the highest risk, with potential costs reaching $200 billion, while the Zambezi River exhibits the greatest uncertainty, with estimated impacts ranging from $50 billion to $125 billion.
• To enhance climate resilience, SEI recommends five specific policy actions: creating technical guidelines for climate-sensitive sectors, promoting an open-data knowledge repository, establishing a project preparation facility for resilience master plans, launching professional training programs, and setting up an observatory for climate-resilient infrastructure in Africa.

APA

Stockholm Environment Institute (2019). Enhancing the climate resilience of Africa’s water and energy infrastructure. https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/enhancing-the-climate-resilience-of-africas-water-and-energy-infrastructure.pdf

Chicago

Stockholm Environment Institute. Enhancing the climate resilience of Africa’s water and energy infrastructure. 2019. https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/enhancing-the-climate-resilience-of-africas-water-and-energy-infrastructure.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Stockholm Environment Institute |title=Enhancing the climate resilience of Africa’s water and energy infrastructure |date=October 2019 |url=https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/enhancing-the-climate-resilience-of-africas-water-and-energy-infrastructure.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{stockholmenvironmentinstitute2019enhancing, author = {{Stockholm Environment Institute}}, title = {{Enhancing the climate resilience of Africa’s water and energy infrastructure}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, year = {2019}, month = oct, url = {https://www.sei.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/enhancing-the-climate-resilience-of-africas-water-and-energy-infrastructure.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }