Is Africa about to see the solar energy boom you need?

Solar panels for sale in Niamey, Niger, a country where solar energy flourishes

Bourreima Hama/AFP via Getty Images

A standard increase in the solar panels flowing from China to countries in Africa during the past year is a sign that the continent is witnessing a rapid building of renewable energy. This can help expand access to cheap and clean electricity and reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels.

“This is not a big explosion itself,” he says. Dave Jones In Ember, UK Energy Research Tank. “It is the beginning of takeoff.”

Jones and his colleagues analyzed him Data On exports of Chinese solar panels since 2017. There are some capabilities to manufacture solar panels in Africa – but as with most of the world, Chinese imports are almost all the supply of the continent.

Between June 2024 and 2025, researchers found that exports to Africa increased by 60 percent compared to the previous year, as it was slightly more than 15 gigawatts of imported energy ability during that period.

Unlike the previous boom in 2022 and 2023, which was mostly driven by imports to South Africa, this upward trend was spread throughout the continent – where 20 countries witnessed import records and 25 countries importing more than 100 megawatts of panels. “It is not led by a state or a state,” says Jones. “For me, this is the most incredible part of the story.”

South Africa was still a pioneer, as it imported about a quarter of a total. But other countries also imported a group of paintings: Nigeria ranked second with 1721 megawatts, followed by Algeria with 1199 megawatts, around the tenth of the total. Over the past two years, solar panels have faded from China to countries in Africa – with the exception of South Africa – more than three times.

Assuming that all the paintings that were imported during the past year were installed, researchers estimate that 16 countries were imported enough to provide at least 5 percent of the current electricity generation; Sierra Leone can generate more than 60 percent of the current electricity with the panels it imported on its own. These solar imports can start compensating for the most expensive fossil fuel imports.

“The transfer of fair energy in Africa is no longer an ambitious future. It is now revealing,” he says now. Amos from Monia In Power Shift Africa, Kenya’s Energy Research Tank. “This transition has tremendous potential to reshape how we have built flexibility to chaos climate and development money.”

The increase is partially from large solar installations under construction, but this is not the entire story. Jones says many imports seem to go to small facilities distributed on rooftops or farms, where people are looking for cheaper and more reliable sources of national networks. There is a similar trend that is operated in Pakistan, which has witnessed explosive growth in solar energy on the surface over the past few years driven by the cost of the panels.

This is an optimistic trend, given 600 million people In Africa – nearly half of the continent’s population – it lacks access to reliable electricity. However, solar development in the continent is still leaving the rest of the world. African countries have struggled to attract investment in renewable energy, and only receive Two percent From the global total in recent decades, according to the International Energy Agency. Over the past year, Pakistan alone witnessed more solar panels than all of Africa, although the population is one.

And Yamania says: “The real challenge before us is to convert this momentum into permanent gains by aligning financing, politics and local industries to ensure that there is no clean energy, but also reliable and affordable and comprehensive prices for all Africans.”