How China’s green tech is undercutting Trump’s ‘drill, baby, drill’ oil strategy in Africa

illuminem summarises for you the essential news of the day, reviewed by our editorial team. Read the full piece on South China Morning Post or enjoy below:

🗞️ Driving the news: African countries are converging on renewables rather than fossil fuels, with cost the deciding factor as Chinese advances in solar and battery technology cut acquisition prices
• The shift runs against the Trump administration's "drill, baby, drill" posture
• Global Solar Council CEO Sonia Dunlop said Africa's solar revolution has arrived, with growth spreading to new markets and rooftop and distributed systems putting power directly into the hands of households and businesses

🔭 The context: Dunlop noted that wars in Ukraine and the Middle East delivered two major fossil fuel supply shocks in four years, exposing the cost of energy dependence, while cheap solar and improved storage enabled rapid substitution
• GSC's Africa Market Outlook for Solar PV 2026–2029 records approximately 4.5 GW of new capacity installed in 2025, a 54% year-on-year rise and the continent's fastest growth on record
• Eight African countries passed 100 MW of annual installation in 2025, double the four recorded in 2024

🌍 Why it matters for the planet: Africa is the region where energy demand will grow most this century
• How demand is met, whether by imported diesel or domestic solar, would shape global emissions for decades
• The import data implies far more capacity arriving than utility-scale projects account for
• Africa imported 18.2 GW of modules in 2025 against a projected 14.3 GW of mainly utility-scale installation across 2026–2027 combined, indicating that distributed systems now represent a substantial and under-recorded share of deployment

⏭️ What's next: GSC's medium-term outlook projects over 33 GW of installed capacity by 2029, more than six times the 2025 addition
• The council identifies finance as the constraint and calls for better data collection so grid and investment planning reflects actual deployment

💬 One quote: "Africa's solar revolution is here. Growth is spreading to new markets across the continent, and rooftop and distributed systems are putting power directly into the hands of households and businesses" — Sonia Dunlop, CEO, Global Solar Council

📈 One stat: Approximately 4.5 GW of new solar capacity installed in Africa in 2025, a 54% year-on-year increase.

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