GEIDCO's Joint Development Proposal Promotes Africa's Clean Energy Development, Economic Growth

Several African presidents have spoken highly of "Chinese solution" to making full use of African countries' energy and power to promote African economic growth.

A joint development mode of "electric power, mining, metallurgy, industry and trade" was proposed during the meeting between Blaise Compaore, Burkina Faso's president, and Liu Zhenya, chairman of the Global Energy Interconnection Development and Cooperation Organization (GEIDCO) on July 3.

The plan requires making full use of Africa’s rich resources of clean energy and minerals and creating a collaborative industrial chain of electric power, mining, metallurgy, industry and trade to realize a positive cycle of "investment-development-production-export-reinvestment" and improve the development scale, quality and efficiency of African countries' economies.

It is a cross-national, cross-industry approach and a practical solution to break through restrictions on development of infrastructure investment in African countries and has been recognized by many African countries' leaders.

How do African countries face the future?

Africa is a land of rich natural and mineral resources. Its water, solar and wind energy resources account 12 percent, 40 percent and 32 percent of total global amounts respectively and its mineral reserves including bauxite, gold, manganese, phosphorite and chromite rank top among five continents.

However, the resources can hardly be developed because of a lack of money, limited markets and undeveloped technologies.

Located in the middle of Africa, the Congo River is a main hydro power resource.

An overview of the downstream Congo River [Photo/sasac.gov.cn]

For instance, the section from Kinshasa to the river's downstream estuary can produce 700 billion kWh of electricity per year, which is seven times the capacity of the Three Gorges hydropower station, while its installed capacity of 110 million kW is five times that of the Three Gorges.

The first and second phases of the Inga Hydropower Project was undertaken in the 1970s and 1980s. The project's gross installed capacity was 1.78 million kW, and the development rate was less than two percent of the river's total hydroenergy.

Later, the construction of the hydropower project came to a halt, leaving the rich hydraulic power unattainable.

In addition, a large volume of ore resources has been exported as primary product because of a shortage of electricity to smelt and process it, which seriously restricted African countries' economic growth.

It is estimated that the value of bauxite developed in the Republic of Equatorial Guinea can increase by more than seven times by smelting and processing the bauxite into aluminum products.