…Why the gap between a working pilot and a financeable portfolio, not the gap between diesel and solar, is the story
One conversation keeps returning whenever I think about the future of mini-grids in Africa. It was not with an engineer discussing solar panels or a financier debating interest rates. It was with a project developer who had done almost everything right. The feasibility studies had been completed. Community engagement had taken months. The demand assessment was sound. The technology had been selected. The economics worked. Yet the project remained stalled for reasons that had little to do with electricity.
“The hardest part isn’t building the mini-grid anymore,” he told me. “The hardest part is getting from one successful project to the next hundred.” That observation captures one of the least discussed realities in energy access today. We have spent years improving the technology that powers mini-grids. We have spent far less time improving the systems that allow thousands of successful projects to become a market capable of attracting institutional capital at scale.
That gap; not between diesel and solar, but between a working pilot and a financeable portfolio is the subject of this piece. That gap is the subject of this piece.
