Energy price modeling in sub-Saharan Africa: an systematic literature review

Data availability statement: All data that support the findings of this study are included within the article (and any supplementary information files).Copyright © 2022 The Author(s). Researchers have found that despite a wide range of renewable energy sources in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), renewable energy pricing policies have focused extensively on metered electricity energy, an early source of renewable energy. Supply, access, and regulation of price for metered electricity energy is mostly controlled by the governments across SSA. There is an increasing use of other renewable energy sources including portable electricity, solar power, and wind power. However, in SSA, the pricing for domestic renewable domestic renewable power such as portable electricity, rechargeable cookstoves, and portable solar power sources are left to the market to legislate, with energy prices dependent on forces of demand and supply and seldom on clear scientific models. This commercially focused energy market means businesses operating in the energy industry are more interested in profits and set prices relative to their market perceptions. The main problem with the energy market in SSA is the lack of a participatory approach where customers, businesses, the government, and other stakeholders are involved in the pricing for energy. We further note that lack of a participatory approach in energy pricing is a major challenge in uptake and demand for the domestic renewable energy sources. Through a systematic literature review, including a review of peer-reviewed journals, documents from energy utility companies, and published information on the websites for energy companies, this review analyzes the current application of energy price modeling and hypothesizes that mobile technology and a participatory pricing approach can improve pricing for domestic renewable power. Our initial literature review showed that energy price modeling had received little attention in SSA, especially for domestic renewable power energy sources. This paper, therefore, fills this gap by using a systematic literature review to consolidate knowledge on how energy price modeling has been applied in the SSA context. The systematic literature review results reveal four commonly used models: time series, artificial neural network, hybrid iterative reactive adaptive, and hybrid models. These energy pricing models are mainly applied to metered electricity power, the predominant source of energy in SSA. The literature hypothesizes that applying mobile technology to energy pricing and a participatory approach involving the consumers and energy supply businesses can move SSA closer to transitioning to renewable energy. Although other factors have hindered this transition, a participatory energy pricing approach incorporating relevant pricing models and market information creates potential solutions to these challenges. In the discussion, we hypothesize that a participatory approach to price modeling with the incorporation of mobile technology can be used at the household level to improve energy decision-making. For this to work, energy price modeling for domestic renewable sources should be simplified, user-friendly, and accessible to households. In conclusion, we recommend that SSA governments develop a more holistic view of energy price modeling to better harness the potential for domestic renewable energy sources.This work is based on research by the Africa-UK Trilateral Research Chair ID SARCI18076349612, under the Newton Fund—National Research Foundation of South Africa partnership, Grant Number 120129

‘Bottom up’ approach: A community-based intervention in fighting non-communicable diseases in urban informal settlements Kenya

Objective: The main objective of this study was to identify challenges faced by healthcare front-liners towards health promotion in the prevention and management of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) amongst the urban 25 - 59-year olds living in urban informal settlements within Kamukunji, Nairobi County. Design: Using the design thinking methodology, this qualitative research aimed at exploring the use of an innovative communication strategy using community-based interventions as a new approach towards NCDs prevention and management. Setting: This study was carried out in two community units within California Ward, in Kamukunji Sub-county, one of the most populous sub-counties in Nairobi Participants: 7 CHVs, 6 Sub-county health officers and 3 Design Thinking practitioners were included in this study. Intervention: A ‘bottom-up approach’ of involving healthcare front-liners in communities in decision making about their health choices and what works best for them, is an unexplored area in health promotion programmes in Kenya. Towards this end, a co-design workshop conducted with the key stakeholders helped in framing and designing health promotion and communication messages that could have a major impact in the reduction of NCDs and related risk factors and increase health-seeking behaviour within the community. Results: The significance of the findings from this qualitative study identified major challenges which included irrelevant and poor health information, education and communication (IEC) material, poor health education and training methods and tools, socio-cultural barriers as well as limited health literacy levels amongst the community members. It was also observed that the current health promotion programmes used were designed and implemented by the National Government, who were not fully aware of the challenges faced at the grassroots. Conclusion: This paper argues that community engagement in designing health promotion programmes goes a long way in influencing healthbehaviour change among community members. &nbsp

From energy security to security of energy services: the role of gendered innovations in living labs

ORCID® identifiers B. Batinge 0000-0002-9093-7520; J.K. Musango 0000-0001-9635-0002; F. Ceschin 0000-0002-7273-9408; A. Ambole 0000-0003-4315-8804; S. Smit 0000-0002-8254-7688; M. Mukama 0000-0002-1412-7251.Copyright (c) 2022 Benjamin Batinge, Josephine Kaviti Musango, Fabrizio Ceschin, Amollo Ambole, Suzanne Smit, Matia Mukama, Aine Petrulaityte. Energy security remains a concern in Sub-Saharan Africa. The conceptualisation of energy security at the urban household level has shifted from the security of energy supply to the security of energy services, which is focused more on the demand side. Women and young girls are affected the most by insecure energy services. However, energy policy discourses often fail to focus on the security of energy services or to recognise gender roles in the provision of energy services at the household level. It is therefore imperative to develop innovative and gender-sensitive energy services solutions with a new paradigm of participatory solution design, such as living labs. We assessed living labs and the energy security landscape in poor urban environments through a systematic literature review, and proposed a framework for demonstrating how living labs could be used as a lever to promote the security of energy services. The security of energy services in poor urban households could be improved by harnessing the different innovative strengths of the respective genders. Living labs provide an ideal space for co-generating, co-designing, and co-learning to produce tailored energy services solutions. There is a need for a collaborative effort in resourcing researchers to undertake practical investigations of interactive multi-stakeholder platforms with those who are intended to benefit from the policy to increase its impact and to bridge the science-policy divide

Building capacity towards what? Proposing a framework for the analysis of energy transition governance in the context of urban informality in Sub-Saharan Africa

There is an emerging scholarship that criticises the conceptualisation of urban informality from a deficit view and emphasises that informality constitutes a way of life, a practice in its own right. We argue that energy is part of the informal way of life and that energy transitions need to take into account the specificities of urban informality when used for policy. Acknowledging energy practices is necessary to improve the justice of energy transitions, including the urban poor in energy transitions without denying the legitimacy of slum dwellers’ ways of life. In this paper, we analyse energy governance in informal urban settlements as implemented by national governments, municipalities and non-governmental organisations, with case studies from Sub-Saharan Africa. We develop a policy analysis framework that assesses (1) the practices of problem definition; (2) the creation of policy options and strategy; (3) the mix of capacities mobilised; and (4) the type of instruments used. The framework is applied to three case studies of energy policies in informal settlements in Kenya, South Africa and Uganda. Results show a strong preference for regulation and technological fixes and do not create capacity to acknowledge and integrate the specific challenges of urban informality and informal ways of life in energy policy, hence falling short of addressing social justice in energy transitions

Mediating household energy transitions through co-design in urban Kenya, Uganda and South Africa

Approaches to providing sustainable energy in cities have generated considerable interest in academic and policy circles. The development of this body of work, however, has not shed much light on the modes of intermediation that are needed to reconfigure urban energy systems towards sustainability in energy-poor countries. This paper focuses on the role of academics as knowledge intermediaries who can trigger cross-sector collaborations around innovations for a sustainable energy transition in African cities. The research presented here was generated by an interdisciplinary research team made up of partners in Kenya, Uganda and South Africa. The research partners set out to better understand how sustainable energy transitions can be achieved through collaborative efforts between community members, experts and policy actors in the three countries. This paper provides evidence-based reflections on how the research partners used participatory methods to facilitate solution co-design and knowledge co-production over a period of two years under the Leading Integrated Research for Agenda 2030 in Africa (LIRA 2030) program. A key knowledge outcome of the research partnership is an improved understanding of how transdisciplinary research across the sub-region can be used to unearth the socio-spatial, cultural and political dimensions of energy in relation to other urban services such as health and housing. Based on this understanding, the paper proposes transdisciplinary co-design as a promising approach to providing sustainable energy in urban informal settlements in Sub-Saharan Africa

Design and Poverty : A Review of Contexts, Roles of Poor People, and Methods

Design is essential to fulfil unmet or under-served needs of resource-poor societies, supporting their social and human development. A great deal of design research has been undertaken in such low resource settings, and is discussed under different names, such as ‘community development engineering’, ‘humanitarian engineering’, ‘appropriate technology’, ‘design for development’, ‘design at the Base of the Pyramid’, etc. This has created an important need to know what has been examined and learnt so far and to plan for further investigation. To address this, we review a broad range of literature, with close examination of 30 design studies in this field. This reveals a multifaceted picture, showing a great diversity in investigation and reporting of attributes of context (income, rural and urban, design sectors, countries, and gender), the roles of poor people (consumers, producers, and co-designers), characteristics of research methods employed (e.g. descriptive and prescriptive, data collection methods, qualitative and quantitative aspects, and unit of analysis), and design topics. Based on the review results, we offer recommendations for further research, identifying concerns that researchers ought to have about this field and suggesting ways in which research in this field can be undertaken and reported