Africa’s Vast Solar and Mineral Resources at Risk of Being Left Untapped, IEA Warns

Energy investment in Africa needs to more than double by the end of the decade if the continent is to meet its energy and climate goals. However, high costs are putting off much-needed investment in the region’s plentiful clean-energy resources and huge reserves of critical minerals, the International Energy Agency said.

“African countries have huge energy potential, including a spectacular range and quality of renewable-energy resources,” said Fatih Birol, executive director of the Paris-based agency in a report published jointly with the African Development Bank on Wednesday. “But these riches are largely untapped and they will remain so without greatly improved access to capital.”

Africa is home to more than half of the world’s best solar resources as well as possessing great potential for hydroelectric and wind-power projects, according to the IEA. It is also uniquely placed to contribute to industries behind the transition away from fossil fuels. It accounts for 80% of the world’s platinum reserves, half of all cobalt reserves, and 40% of manganese reserves, all of which are expected to be crucial to technologies such as autocatalysts and electric batteries, the agency said.

The report’s figures also pose a challenge for the West and the U.S. in particular, which is seeking to secure diverse sources of critical materials. In recent years, the West has lost clout in Africa as China has become the continent’s largest trading partner and fourth largest investor. Much of China’s investment in Africa goes toward energy projects and the nation’s lead in renewable technologies will likely see it grow as a funder of African renewable energy projects, the IEA said.

“Energy investment on our continent has fallen short,” wrote William Ruto, president of Kenya, in the report’s foreword. “It is imperative we take bold steps to more than double energy investment here in the next decade, with a primary focus on clean energy.”

From around $90 billion today, annual spending on Africa’s energy needs must more than double to $200 billion by 2030, two-thirds of which will need to go toward clean energy projects, the report said.

Despite the investment goal—which the IEA says will allow African nations to meet their agreed climate targets as laid out in the Paris Agreement and achieve universal access to modern energy systems—energy spending in Africa has been falling over the past five years as investment in fossil fuels has declined and spending on renewable energy projects has flatlined. The continent makes up just 3% of global energy spending.

The indebtedness of many African nations is holding back public spending on energy projects while private investors are reluctant to invest because of a prevalence of fragile states, absent regulations and perceptions of political or reputational risks.

All of these are pushing up the cost of capital which makes many African energy projects financially unviable despite ample local resources and proven technologies such as wind or solar power, the report said.

The cost of capital for a large-scale renewable energy project in Africa is up to three times higher than in advanced economies and China, the IEA said. For smaller projects, which will be crucial in rural areas, the costs are even higher.

Concessional financing—in which lenders such as international development banks offer developing nations more generous terms such as lower interest rates or longer repayment periods—will be crucial to overcoming those obstacles, the IEA said.

The IEA estimates that only half of electricity grid projects in Africa are commercially viable without such assistance, while most clean cooking projects would be unaffordable.

Despite accounting for 20% of the global population, investment in African energy projects is far too small, leaving much of the continent lacking basic access to electricity or clean cooking fuels, the IEA said.

Currently, 600 million people across Africa lack access to electricity and almost one billion have no access to clean cooking fuels.

$25 billion a year alone would be enough to provide basic access to electricity and clean cooking fuels to all Africans, equivalent to the cost of installing one LNG terminal, something European nations have done in record time following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The report came as African leaders met in Nairobi for the third and final day of the Africa Climate Summit, which has seen calls for debt relief for African nations facing the effects of climate change and hundreds of millions of dollars pledged to Africa’s nascent carbon credits initiative.

African nations are seeking redress for the effects of climate change they experience despite contributing little to carbon emissions, the main driver of global warming. The continent accounts for around 2% to 3% of global carbon emissions but is particularly exposed to extreme weather.

First, the good news for office landlords: A post-Labor Day bump nudged return-to-office rates in mid-September to their highest level since the onset of the pandemic.

Now the bad: Office attendance in big cities is still barely half of what it was in 2019, and company get-tough measures are proving largely ineffective at boosting that rate much higher.

Indeed, a number of forces—from the prospect of more Covid-19 cases in the fall to a weakening economy—could push the return rate into reverse, property owners and city officials say.

More than before, chief executives at blue-chip companies are stepping up efforts to fill their workspace. Facebook parent Meta Platforms, Amazon and JPMorgan Chase are among the companies that have recently vowed to get tougher on employees who don’t show up. In August, Meta told employees they could face disciplinary action if they regularly violate new workplace rules.

But these actions haven’t yet moved the national return rate needle much, and a majority of companies remain content to allow employees to work at least part-time remotely despite the tough talk.

Most employees go into offices during the middle of the week, but floors are sparsely populated on Mondays and Fridays. In Chicago, some September days had a return rate of over 66%. But it was below 30% on Fridays. In New York, it ranges from about 25% to 65%, according to Kastle Systems, which tracks security-card swipes.

Overall, the average return rate in the 10 U.S. cities tracked by Kastle Systems matched the recent high of 50.4% of 2019 levels for the week ended Sept. 20, though it slid a little below half the following week.

The disappointing return rates are another blow to office owners who are struggling with vacancy rates near record highs. The national office average vacancy rose to 19.2% last quarter, just below the historical peak of 19.3% in 1991, according to Moody’s Analytics preliminary third-quarter data.

Business leaders in New York, Detroit, Seattle, Atlanta and Houston interviewed by The Wall Street Journal said they have seen only slight improvements in sidewalk activity and attendance in office buildings since Labor Day.

“It feels a little fuller but at the margins,” said Sandy Baruah, chief executive of the Detroit Regional Chamber, a business group.

Lax enforcement of return-to-office rules is one reason employees feel they can still work from home. At a roundtable business discussion in Houston last week, only one of the 12 companies that attended said it would enforce a return-to-office policy in performance reviews.

“It was clearly a minority opinion that the others shook their heads at,” said Kris Larson, chief executive of Central Houston Inc., a group that promotes business in the city and sponsored the meeting.

Making matters worse, business leaders and city officials say they see more forces at work that could slow the return to office than those that could accelerate it.

Covid-19 cases are up and will likely increase further in the fall and winter months. “If we have to go back to distancing and mask protocols, that really breaks the office culture,” said Kathryn Wylde, head of the business group Partnership for New York City.

Many cities are contending with an increase in homelessness and crime. San Francisco, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., which are struggling with these problems, are among the lowest return-to-office cities in the Kastle System index.

About 90% of members surveyed by the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce said that the city couldn’t recover until homelessness and public safety problems were addressed, said Rachel Smith, chief executive. That is taken into account as companies make decisions about returning to the office and how much space they need, she added.

Cuts in government services and transportation are also taking a toll. Wait times for buses run by Houston’s Park & Ride system, one of the most widely used commuter services, have increased partly because of labor shortages, according to Larson of Central Houston.

The commute “is the remaining most significant barrier” to improving return to office, Larson said.

Some landlords say that businesses will have more leverage in enforcing return-to-office mandates if the economy weakens. There are already signs of such a shift in cities that depend heavily on the technology sector, which has been seeing slowing growth and layoffs.

But a full-fledged recession could hurt office returns if it results in widespread layoffs. “Maybe you get some relief in more employees coming back,” said Dylan Burzinski, an analyst with real-estate analytics firm Green Street. “But if there are fewer of those employees, it’s still a net negative for office.”

The sluggish return-to-office rate is leading many city and business leaders to ask the federal government for help. A group from the Great Lakes Metro Chambers Coalition recently met with elected officials in Washington, D.C., lobbying for incentives for businesses that make commitments to U.S. downtowns.

Baruah, from the Detroit chamber, was among the group. He said the chances of such legislation being passed were low. “We might have to reach crisis proportions first,” he said. “But we’re trying to lay the groundwork now.”

Africa’s Vast Solar and Mineral Resources at Risk of Being Left Untapped, IEA Warns

High costs have put off most investors from buying into the continent’s plentiful clean-energy reserves

Office owners are struggling with near record-high vacancy rates