The financing agreement for 3 linked solar projects totaling 82 MW in Guinea was signed on 22 September, 10 months after the Guinean Minister of Energy signed the concession agreement in the presence of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and 10 African heads of state at the G20 Compact with Africa summit. 

The agreement is between CleanPower Generation, a Germany-based developer of renewable energy solutions in sub-Saharan Africa, and Frontier Energy, a fund of the Frontier Investment Management Company.

The project is an African-European success story in many ways: the template for the financial model used was provided by the Economic Community of West African States’ (ECOWAS) Centre for Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency (ECREEE), while the financing from Frontier Energy is rooted in a joint European undertaking, the Global Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Fund (GEEREF).

GEEREF, a fund-of-funds structure advised by the European Investment Bank Group, was initially capitalised by the European Union through the European Commission’s Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development, Germany and Norway. On this basis, the second round of GEEREF, which contributes to the fund through which Frontier Energy finances the project in Guinea, was able to raise funds from a broad range of private actors. This is thus a good example for the European approach of blending and leveraging private investments based on initial public inputs.

GET.invest, a European technical assistance instrument supported by the European Union, Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Austria, has helped the project developer navigate the road to bankability. The story of this solar project is also the story of the External Investment Plan and the European partnership with Africa, supporting the aim of entrepreneurs such as CleanPower Generation to provide reliable clean energy at the lowest price available in Guinea today for the benefit of the Guinean government, its state-owned utility EDG, the people of Guinea and emerging Guinean industries.

As one of the first large-scale PV projects in Guinea, CleanPower Generation will contribute significantly to Guinea’s aim to produce 30 % of its energy from renewable sources by 2030.