Special Issue Journal of Human Geography and Environmental Studies

Special Issue 2, December 2018

Article Number: 02

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Leap-Frogging to Renewable Energy Regime in West Africa: Arguing for a Community-led Initiative

Khaleel, A.G., and Chakrabarti, M. 

Pages 381-395

Abstract—The development aspirations of most developing countries have been experiencing serious challenges from different perspectives due variations in the communities within most developing countries. These challenges are further complicated by the interlinkages between different aspects of development; most notable energy-growth-environmental linkages. The level of energy access has been adequately linked to growth and development over the years and achieving this at country level is even more challenging for developing countries especially those in Africa, mainly due to their inherent differences. This paper argued that a community based energy system partly or wholly owned by the Community Enterprise will work well in West Africa for reasons like the availability of supporting initiatives in policy, finance, renewable technologies that are scalable to fit all sizes of demand. This will be based on leap-frogging strategy that enables skipping of generations of old technologies into new technologies in a consistent manner. This will enable the development of private sector at the level of communities to participate in many national, regional and international initiatives while realizing their Sustainable Development Goals - SDGs and creating wealth for themselves in the process.

Keywords—leap-frogging, renewable energy, causality, community-led initiative, SDGs, cooperation