Project Detail

Project: Integrated Sustainability and Resilience Decision Aid for Energy Transition in Sub-Saharan, Africa

This project is developing an Integrated Decision Aid for Sustainable Energy Transition in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

Pursuing the agenda of Sustainable Energy for All (SE4All) to meet SDG 7 and SDGs, and African Union Agenda 63 is sacrosanct. However, the energy sources to pursue the agenda have to overcome sustainability related factors – social, economic, environmental, technical, technological, political and institutional. 

Beyond energy access and mitigation of pollutant emissions, the integration of variable renewables in the electricity grid caused the emergence of other crucial aspects in the energy-planning scenario such as the reliability, flexibility and efficiency of the power systems. Although currently gaining momentum among stakeholders, this resilience related concern is often left off the agenda for sustainable energy. The multifaceted issues render the choice between different energy exploitation proposals a complicated task. The question is: how can SSA handle these issues holistically?

There is an increasing understanding and applications of multi-criteria decision techniques to evaluate and integrate the multifarious issues and make a trade-off on investment decisions on sustainable energy technologies.Therefore,this study will develop and apply of an integrated Sustainability and Resilience Evaluation Framework (ISREF) to prioritize sustainable energy sources in the Sub-Saharan Africa using Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA).

The project has five objectives:

• To investigate the potential technologies for sustainable energy transition in the SSA.
• To develop an Integrated Sustainability and Resilience Evaluation Framework (ISREF) for sustainable energy transition.
• To propose an innovative processes for the selection of MCDA methods for sustainable energy decisions.
• To apply the Integrated Sustainability and Resilience Evaluation Framework (ISREF) to a case study using MCDA.
• To evaluate optimal energy technologies mix scenarios for sustainable energy transition

Methodology

The study is participatory action in design, utilizing qualitative and quantitative methods to achieve its objectives. This include case study, Stakeholders engagement activities, Delphi process, MCDA methods, uncertainties analysis, probability theory, objective and subjective data weighing techniques, and aggregation methods. The resulting framework will tested in Tanzania but applicable to Sub-Saharan Africa energy sector in general.

Expected Impact

The outcome of the study is useful for regional energy pool decisions as well as national and sub-national governments to make decisions on energy investment. It would further enhance the performance of future energy projects through regular assessment of condition of projects thereby taking relevant precautions for their improvement.

Overall, the project will be beneficial to a range of stakeholders, including businesses, policymakers, development organisations, GOs, investors, academia and society.

Engagement

The project involves a participatory action, which means a number of stakeholders from different fields will be engaged, through formal and informal avenues although with different levels of participation.

The research team will promote its research findings using different media including academic and non-academic publications, workshops and an active social media and communication strategy.  Outputs are also expected to be shared at academic seminars, conferences, and workshops throughout the duration of the project.

Research Outputs

Check this page or follow the project on LinkedIn and twitter in due course.

Further communications

Kindly send a direct request to:

Research Team

Aasa Olaoluwa – PhD Candidate

olaoluwa.aasa@arunet.ac.tz or olaoluwa88@gmail.com

+255768873724 or +2348038353217

Supervisors

Dr S. Phoya	Dr R. Monko	Prof. I. Musonda
Ardhi University, Dar es Salaam E-mail: sarahphoya@gmail.com Phone: +255754373321	Ardhi University, Dar es Salaam E-mail: rjmonko1@gmail.com Phone: +25562266955	University of Johannesburg, South Africa E-mail: imusonda@uj.ac.za

Others Collaborators:

Dr G. O. Onatu	Dr G. Nkhonjera
University of Johannesburg, South Africa gonatus@uj.ac.za	University of Johannesburg, South Africa germann@uj.ac.za

Host Institution

Ardhi University, Dar es Salaam, Republic of Tanzania

The research is being implemented under African Sustainable Infrastructure Mobility (ASIM), a project under European Union Intra-Africa Academic Mobility Scheme, and started in November 2022. The project will run for three years until October 2025.