With Africa’s abundance of natural gas and Europe’s desire to wean itself off Russian energy resources, scaling gas production in Africa is being seen as an important part of the solution to Europe’s energy needs.

But as a new discussion paper by the African Climate Foundation (ACF) points out, this flurry of interest is creating a number of risks for African producers including significant transition risks for new gas assets as the world begins shifting to a low carbon future.

The rush for African gas is also raising important questions of equity: why are African resources being used to secure Europe’s energy supply when so many Africans lack access to energy?

Given our significant energy needs as a continent and our need to unlock new development opportunities, the discussion paper asks: what investments best address both our short and longer term energy security and development objectives?

It argues that the case for investing in renewable energy is much more compelling than the case for developing new gas assets but that this will depend on our ability to dramatically scale climate finance to support renewable energy roll out on scale, coupled with increased support from governments and private investors.

The discussion paper and other research from the ACF on gas will be unpacked during a webinar on Thursday 27 October 2022. Save the date by registering here.