US President Barack Obama on February 8th signed into law ‘The Electrify Africa Act’ that is geared at expanding electricity accessibility to millions of households in the Sun-Saharan Africa. It was unanimously passed by the House of Representative as well as the Senate.
The Act seeks to leverage partnerships with the private sector to bring first-time electricity access to over 50 million people in Africa that would otherwise not afford it. It will employ a system of loan guarantees to inject an additional 20,000MW into the continental grid by 2020
The measure is set to save lives, accelerate the fundamental and economic growth of the continent, improve access to education and public health among the most undeserved communities. The major benefactors are local households, schools and small business owners.
The laws highly publicized at Obama’s visit to Kenya in July 2015 dubbed ‘Power Africa’ and is projected to us about $7 billion in US funds financed through the US Export-Import Bank in order to generate 30,000MW of clean energy by the completion of the project.
