Journal Article
Special section of Applied Energy

This special section contains a series of five articles focused on energy and climate change in sub-Saharan Africa. It is well known that energy demand in sub-Saharan Africa is increasing rapidly and that many countries struggle to meet demand. Failure to meet energy demand reduces living standards today and constitutes a substantial brake on economic growth, with implications for future living standards.

This special section seeks to contribute to an improved understanding of the choices involved within the complex interactions of energy, development, and climate. It seeks to bring new ideas and methods to addressing the challenge of developing efficient and reliable energy systems that capitalize on the continent’s considerable endowments and contribute to long run sustainable development. Drawing on expertise across three broad disciplines—climate science, engineering, and economics—the articles in this special section seek to better understand the benefits and cautions of wind, solar, and hydropower systems as well as the integration of these systems with each other and with planned and existing conventional energy production. The articles present new approaches to addressing energy planning problems on a variety of scales in an under-studied region of the world.