ECA/IAEA conducts workshop on Capacity Building in Integrated Resource Planning (IRP) in Africa

December 11, 2006

ECA in collaboration with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is conducting a workshop, from 11-22 December 2006 on Integrated Resource Planning (IRP) for Energy/Electricity in Africa.

In his opening speech Mr. Robert Okello, Director, NEPAD and Regional Integration Division told participants that this was the first of a series of training workshops whose main objective is “to raise awareness of participants from the Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and sub-regional power pools on the benefits of an Integrated Resources Planning (IRP) approach, and build their capacity to effectively use IRP to mainstreaming the sustainable development dimension in planning investments in the electricity supply industry at the regional and national levels.”

He told participants that sub-Saharan Africa's unprecedented energy crisis, characterized by blackouts, power rationing and load shedding is mainly due to “poor energy planning, which in the past, did not pay enough attention to timely investment decisions in power capacity and transmission expansion.”

He noted that as a tool, the IRP approach to energy planning allows electric utilities to consistently compare the cost-effectiveness of all resource alternatives on both the demand and supply side, taking into account their different financial, environmental and reliability characteristics.

Power pools were developed following the severe 1992 drought in Southern Africa that dramatically reduced electricity supply in the hydro-dependent northern part of the sub-region. The creation of the Southern African Power Pool (SAPP) and a SAPP Pool Plan developed since 2001 has helped address the issue of reliability and security of electricity supply in the subregion.

He said that East African countries have suffered power shortages and load shedding since the late 1990s due to recurrent drought and lack of appropriately balanced hydro/thermal power generation mix.

Zimbabwe and, more recently, South Africa (Cape Town), have been experiencing blackouts and power rationing due to delayed investment decisions in power systems expansion.

In light of these challenges, ECA's capacity building programme in the area of IRP for sustainable energy development aims at providing African experts with the necessary analytical tools and skills that will allow them to apply IRP principles for planning investments required for least-cost energy and power expansion at national and sub-regional levels so as to prevent any future energy crises.

Citing the case of the Southern African Power Pool (SAPP), which developed a coordinated pool plan in 2001, Mr. Okello noted that regional planning can result in substantial savings on investment requirements for power projects compared to individual country's national planning (US$8 billion vs. US$11 billion). He added, “The East African Community (EAC) has also just completed an East African Power Master Plan which identified least-cost energy projects that could be implemented to help ensure sustainable electricity supply in the East Africa region.”

Ms. Farzana Naqvi from IAEA welcomed the collaboration with ECA, and noted the agency's willingness to share its resources, capacity and analytical tools to assist Africa's member States in achieving the Millennium Development Goals through using the right tools to study and address the environmental, and socio-economic impact of energy utilization and increase the capacity of the professions in energy sector planning.