The International Energy Agency warned on Monday that Africa must act rapidly to capitalize on its massive natural gas reserves, which the world will only want until it can transition to lower-carbon technologies.
The IEA said in its Africa Energy Outlook for 2022 published on Monday that by the end of the decade, Africa could be able to export 30 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe, which is now gas-hungry as it seeks to lessen its dependency on Russia.
In a ground-breaking outlook in 2021, the group of 31 primarily industrialized countries stated that meeting a United Nations goal of net zero emissions by mid-century meant that no new fossil fuel investments would be required starting this year.
In an interview with reporters, Executive Director Fatih Birol said that Africa’s gas development does not contradict that.
He went on to say that the continent has borne the burden of climate change while emitting a minuscule fraction of the emissions created by the industrialized world and having a finite amount of time to collect hydrocarbon profits.
“What Africa does with its gas does not make the top 500 things we need to do to meet our climate commitments,” Birol added.
“If the world is successful in reducing down gas demand in line with reaching net zero emissions by midcentury, new long lead time gas projects risk failing to recover their upfront costs,” the Paris-based agency warned in a report released Monday.
Birol estimates that if all of Africa’s gas finds are brought into production, it will supply an additional 90 billion cubic meters of gas per year by 2030, with around two-thirds going to local needs and the remainder going to export.
The IEA estimates that flaring less methane may generate a third of new output, reducing new developments and emissions.
Oil- and gas-producing regions, such as Africa, have reacted angrily to the suggestion that averting climate change would imply keeping resources underground. They claim that demand is strong and that rich countries have had a centuries-long head start thanks to hydrocarbons.
Despite having a fifth of the world’s population, Africa has accounted for less than 3% of global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions thus far and has the lowest emissions per capita of any region on the planet, according to the IEA.
By the end of the decade, renewables such as solar, wind, hydropower, and geothermal energy could account for four-fifths of the continent’s power generation capacity, according to the IEA.
