‘I want to do it in a big way’: Meet the Nigerian women leading solar initiatives

32-year-old green energy entrepreneur Yetunde Fadeyi will never forget what inspired her to start a clean energy firm in Nigeria.

As a six-year-old, Fadeyi’s closest friend, Fatima, was killed by carbon monoxide poisoning in her Lagos home, along with her father and pregnant mother.

“She used to come over for sleepovers. But that day she didn’t,” says Fadeyi. “It was the time they were stealing people’s generators, so they kept [the generator] in an enclosed space and by the time it was morning they were dead.”

Petrol-powered generators like the one Fatima’s family had are valuable resources due to the country’s energy challenges, making them targets for theft if left outside the home.

Extra kids die from air pollution – mainly within the home – in Nigeria than in every other African country, and Fadeyi made it her life’s calling to prevent the energy poverty causing such deaths.

After a childhood in Lagos tormented by intermittent electrical energy, a degree in chemistry and training in solar panel installation, Fadeyi started Renewable Energy and Environmental Sustainability (REES). The non-profit is devoted to climate advocacy and providing clean energy to poor communities in rural Nigeria.

Top Stories Tamfitronics Bringing solar energy to Nigeria’s poorest homes

Since its inception in 2017, REES Africa has supplied solar energy to over 6,000 people in the poorest parts of Nigeria, funded by grants and philanthropic donations.

It provides solar microgrids, which generate energy through solar panels and store them in battery banks for distribution. The limited grids bring high-quality, low-cost and reliable power to up to 100 homes each, powering light bulbs, radios, sockets and other low-energy appliances.

Fadeyi says that energy companies don’t see any likelihood for profit in poor and marginalised communities. With around 40 per cent of Nigerians residing below the national poverty line, it’s up to companies like Fadeyi’s to fill the gap for now.

Top Stories Tamfitronics Solar energy is transforming women’s lives in Nigeria

Within the village of Aba-Oje, a rural outpost in southwest Nigeria, 76-year-old community chief Muritala Ojeleye says life has changed completely since REES Africa installed a solar grid in 2018.

“We had not had light here since the history of this village — not even electrical poles. Life used to be very difficult for us,” he says.

Mary Ojo, a 46-year-old veteran trader, agrees. She has given birth to her 5 children by the light of a kerosene lamp.

“The closest hospital here is two to three hours away,” she says. “The midwives bring babies here, and [previously] if it happened in the evening they used atupa [kerosene lanterns] to see clearly.”

Thanks to the electricity, she can now work longer and earn more money because she doesn’t have to stop working at dusk.

It’s making differences like this, particularly for females in the communities she works in, that pressure Fadeyi.

“At any time when we carry out field work, we end up crying,” she says. “I’m actually envisioning what’s taking place now on the tiring nights in nearly all these places.

“Perhaps a girl’s husband is beating her as a result of she didn’t receive food on time. These are the points, of gender-based violence, folks getting bitten by snakes, females getting raped – and so these are the points, and only having access to electrical energy can change that.”

Top Stories Tamfitronics An oil rich nonetheless energy wretched country

Despite being Africa’s top oil producer and holding the continent’s excellent gas deposits, Nigeria has the lowest access to electricity of any country on Earth. It generates at most about one-third of its grid capacity, leaving over 92 million people living off-grid.

Nigeria’s electricity production still relies heavily on fossil fuels, and its energy supply is unreliable: over 200 grid collapses in the past nine years have resulted in widespread blackouts and an annual loss of $29 billion (€26.8 bn), according to the World Bank.

The government plans to transition to renewable energy sources, aiming for net-zero emissions by 2060 while ending energy poverty in the country. But this requires investments of around $400 billion (€370 bn), and the energy access gap continues to grow as the population increases.

Top Stories Tamfitronics Meet the veteran oil expert scaling up solar microgrids

Professor Yinka Omoregbe is hoping to bridge this energy gap as CEO of Etin Energy, offering energy to off-grid communities using mini solar grids. She brings a wealth of skills to the role as a veteran national expert on the reform of Nigeria’s petroleum sector and a veteran legal expert general.

In its first twelve months, Etin Energy supplied electrical energy to over 5,200 people in three small coastal communities in Edo State, southern Nigeria.

While the implications thus far are limited, Omoregbe’s ambitions are much bigger. “We are going to have grids in every location, in every location, and we can still be in vulnerable communities. We are in a position to have confirmed that it is possible to profitably give green energy to vulnerable communities.”

True to her private sector roots, Omoregbe is here to make a profit, as well as a difference.

“I’m no longer there just to look at two communities and feel very pleased with myself. I’m not an NGO. I don’t want to be disrespectful, but much of the time, NGOs are very satisfied with minor outcomes or limited outcomes. I’m not, because it is a major issue, and I want to address it in a significant way if I can, and also invite others to address it in a significant way.”

She sees energy provision as a key part in ending poverty; particularly in rural Nigeria, where nearly half of the country’s population lives, yet only about 34 per cent of people have access to electricity.

“These rural communities were completely left out of the climate change conversation, even though they are the most affected,” says Omoregbe.

“In all of these, women and their children are the hardest hit. Women suffer the brunt of poverty. The face of poverty is truly the face of a young woman, because they are the most deprived… but in reality, the entire community suffers.”

“There are gender dimensions to poverty, in every sense, as there are gender dimensions to energy poverty.”

Top Stories Tamfitronics Rising solar energy entrepreneurs

Women being disproportionately affected by energy poverty is the foundation behind Solar Sister, a US-based NGO that fights energy poverty while lifting women in Africa out of business poverty too.

Founded in 2009 by veteran US investment banker Katherine Lucey, the initiative aims to train women in rural communities as solar entrepreneurs, owning and operating businesses selling solar-powered products such as lamps, torches, chargers and radios.

Solar Sister currently works in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Nigeria. Since its origin in Nigeria nine years ago, the NGO has trained over 3,000 women to run their own small solar businesses, and they now operate in 29 of Nigeria’s 36 states.

“When we started nine years ago, most people interested in energy were men,” recalls Olasimbo Sojinrin, Solar Sisters’ Chief Operating Officer in Nigeria.

“But we found that women were particularly and disproportionately affected by the challenges related to this energy poverty. So for us, it really made sense to build this network of women entrepreneurs that is not only going to be victims of energy poverty, but can be at the forefront of solving these issues,” says Sojinrin.

It’s not only about economic empowerment for women when they earn money selling their products; it’s also about the broader benefits that clean energy provides, she explains.

“Saving time, saving money, the fact that they now have orderly lights and the ripple effect of that which spans […] through health or education of the children or ultimately for the family no longer having to inhale toxic fumes.”

Top Stories Tamfitronics Nigeria’s authorities want to ramp up renewable funding

Nigeria has significant renewable energy potential, as a recent report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) states.

The agency recommends that Nigeria’s authorities significantly increase investment in renewables to keep pace with a rapidly growing population.

“Funds to deploy large-scale renewable energy initiatives required to power these communities is one of our main challenges,” says Yetunde Fadeyi.

Omoregbe agrees. “The overall obstacle that you may also encounter is financing.”

But, she continues, she won’t let any obstacles get in her way.

“I haven’t received any complaints—I’ve just started out. I’m excited. If I encounter any major obstacles at a point, I will speak up, and I will speak up…no matter what I encounter that I need to set out, I will move forward and carry it out. It’s if I cannot carry it out, that I will call it an issue. That’s how I view it.”

This article has been published in collaboration with Egab.