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Authority in Libya’s oil and gas sector is fraying, with a flood of internal administrative correspondence leaking from the Government of National Unity and especially from NOC, whose failure to account for its multi-billion dollar budgets is now threatening operations, while two rival ministers compete for control and services giant Schlumberger has threatened to suspend operations until its debts are paid, writes John Hamilton.

Electricity-starved Guinea Bissau will get $48m from the International Development Association, Green Climate Fund and Esmap to catalyse solar energy generation and improve on low levels of electricity access.

Despite the first cargo being lifted from the Niger-Benin Export Pipeline (NBEP) sea terminal in May, cross-border relations have continued to sour, after Benin arrested five Nigerien pipeline employees and a second crude loading was aborted, while insurgents have attacked the pipeline in Niger, writes Virgile Ahissou in Cotonou with Marc Howard.

Niger faces a variety of longstanding security worries, primarily from the jihadist Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province (Iswap) insurgencies across the Lake Chad region, but also from opposition by other rebel groups long opposed to the capital’s writ, principally from the Tuareg and Toubou communities.

A big new investment in the clean cooking value chain adds to the momentum building behind efforts to tackle a major social and environmental issue across sub-Saharan Africa, while downstream giant Vivo has also completed its merger with Engen and is looking to expand its C&I power offering.

Anglo-French independent Perenco has bought into the leading floating LNG developer, building on their existing Cameroon partnership.

Pan-African private equity firm Inspired Evolution has closed the second round of its Evolution III fund, following on from its first $200m close in March 2023. Looking to build on its substantial support for African renewable IPPs, Evolution III will also back commercial and industrial (C&I), off-grid, microgrid and energy efficiency firms.

The African Development Bank has substantially increased its capital to stay aligned with ratings agency demands and is using a wider range of financial instruments to raise funds as group president Akinwumi Adesina shows off the AfDB’s ever increasing ambitions for infrastructure development and a wide range of other initiatives.

The increasingly assertive African Development Bank’s support for the proposed multi-user Liberty infrastructure corridor would enable production from HPX’s Mount Nimba iron ore play and increase demand for power from regional hydroelectric schemes. It could also lead to adjacent iron ore developments in Liberia, which is strongly backing the scheme, writes Marc Howard.

A lot of officials, developers and financiers are working very hard to bring electricity supply projects to market and into service, but persistent bottlenecks across the value chain still too often stall otherwise good projects, according to African Energy Live Data’s analysis of the deal flow. The completion of stalled projects, along with a roll-out of mini-grids and decentralised solutions, would lead poorer consumers further towards universal access, while giving wealthier urban populations and commercial clients improved services and more productive uses of energy.

Zurich-based commercial and industrial (C&I) developer Candi has received equity finance from new investors to bankroll solar projects in South Africa and India.

The potential of Morocco’s ‘southern provinces’ to generate large amounts of solar and wind power does little for the main consumption centres much further north if the kingdom’s transmission systems can’t handle the electrons. As geopolitical perceptions shift, projects in the disputed Western Sahara to develop these renewables and transport the electricity northwards could offer opportunities for foreign investors – and France seems to have taken the bait, with an apparently significant change of policy that could lead to a major investment in HVDC connections between Dakhla and Casablanca.

State agencies have new leadership, but Onee’s Tarik Hamane and Masen’s Tarik Moufaddal, their political masters and the wider electricity supply industry have big barriers to overcome if Morocco is to fulfil its much-vaunted renewable energy potential and provide a stable base for the next phases of the kingdom’s economic take-off, write John Hamilton and a Special Correspondent in Rabat.

The appointment of a younger generation executive who has spent his career in senior roles within TotalEnergies to run the Moroccan Agency for Sustainable Energy is an indication of intent to advance a substantial pipeline of delayed and expensive projects, but to succeed Tarik Moufaddal will need to add political nous to his corporate abilities, writes Waly Dione Faye in Casablanca.

A stronger sense is emerging that the federal government in Abuja is finally prioritising asset transfers, despite state-owned Nigeria National Petroleum Company (NNPC)’s opposition to key deals – notably ExxonMobil’s proposed sale of shallow water assets to Seplat Energy.