about us

Power Ventures Africa (PV Africa) develops renewable energy solutions for businesses in Africa, making them more productive, efficient and energy-independent

Renewable energy systems provide a clean, cost-effective and robust complement to grid electricity and diesel generators. The technology is widespread and continues to drop in cost. However, few firms have either the know-how or up-front capital to make appropriate technology selections and finance a renewable stand-alone power source. This limits the use of equipment and technology that would make African farms and businesses more productive and sustainable.

PV Africa addresses this challenge by designing, sourcing, financing and installing energy systems that commercial and industrial businesses can use immediately and pay for over time. We work in partnership with a wide range of technology providers to set up standalone renewable energy systems that can power just about anything.

For our forest carbon business, Carbon Ventures Africa, visit us here.

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Our Services

PV Africa bridges the needs of commercial and industrial businesses throughout Africa and the development of renewable energy technologies.

Extensive experience of renewable energy systems

We begin most projects with a feasibility study of the client’s energy needs. This informs the system design, and, most importantly, establishes a baseline for cost-savings over other energy options.

Financing

We recognize that many commercial and industrial (C&I) clients have capital constraints and will often require financing solutions that allow them to spread out the cost of capital over time. In many cases, renewable energy systems can be paid for over 3-4 years from the savings they deliver in this time, making their implementation cost neutral in the short-term and highly cost beneficial in the medium to long-term. Our financial modelling ensures that clients (and investors) can have confidence in renewable technologies.

OPERATING IN AFRICA

Local context can make or break a business; understanding the unique opportunities and challenges of doing business in Africa is our forte. We work with clients to ensure that local business regulations are understood and do not get in the way of doing business.

Robust system design

Though plug-and-play systems have come a long way in recent years, C&I businesses have unique energy needs that are rarely met through off-the-shelf systems. We work with clients to ensure that appropriate technologies (PV, biomass, etc.) are chosen to meet current and future energy needs and can integrate smoothly with existing systems.

Procurement

We work with clients to develop a procurement model that delivers the best value from the global renewable-energy equipment market, taking into account local taxes and duties. We are also experienced at how to ensure the benefits of manufacturers’ warranties can be realised in the African context.

Logistics

A known risk in many African countries, PV Africa works with established builders, contractors, and both international and local importers to deliver the project on time and in one piece.

Operations and Maintenance

We design an O&M strategy that is appropriate for your context to ensure your system continues to operate effectively for many years to come. This may involve third-party contracts or work with client employees to ensure that the system is being properly maintained and operated, delivering optimum power to the client’s operations.

“With the new irrigation in place, 30 of GreenPath’s smallholder partner farmers will shift to year-round production, increase their revenue, and do so without burning fossil fuels. As a smallholder-driven, speciality foods company, this marks a significant early step in our efforts to become completely carbon neutral.”

— GreenPath's Director of Operations, Eric Couper

PROJECTs

PV Africa has Developed energy projects across Africa and the Middle EasT - from small community-based projects to utility-scale installations. We have worked on more than 2GW of installed power capacity in sub-Saharan Africa.

PV Africa has been working with the UK and a number of EU Governments to install renewable energy systems at their Embassies and official residences. The high cost of diesel and grid down time - not to mention their negative impact on the planet - means that many governments are increasingly focused on replacing ageing electrical infrastructure.

PV Africa’s work involves full life cycle management of PV system implementation, including:

Feasibility studies
Conceptual design
Contracting strategy development
Tendering
Contract negotiation
Management of implementation contractors

Mushandi a leading berry and horticultural farm operating from two separate sites in Zimbabwe, one in Macheke (Home Farm) and one in Ruwa (Pinfields Farm). PV Africa is working at Pinfields Farm to install a renewable energy system that is best suited ensure that the full their drip irrigation system (which includes advanced computerised fertigation controllers).

Power Ventures Africa is a shareholder of Zimbabwe’s Asambe Mobility. The deal, which is the first of its kind in Zimbabwe, will support the development of new e-bikes and e-scooter networks in the country. Asambe is a newly established Pan-African electric scooter and electric bicycle delivery, vehicle sharing, and guided tour service. Instead of getting lost in a complex informal/formal public transport system or paying exorbitant personal taxi rates, Asambe presents a clean, fun and cost effective way to explore a town or city. Asambe is Zulu for let’s go. Let’s go green, let’s go explore, let’s go together!

Rift Valley has a long history of operating in Sub-Saharan Africa. Some of the Group’s individual businesses have been in operation since the early 20th century. From its inception, Rift Valley has focused on building sustainable, long-term businesses in agriculture and energy. In this vein, the company has contracted PV Africa to model the current and future power needs of 20 Rift Valley partner farms to deliver optimised renewable energy development plans for each location, based on agreed criteria for optimisation. PV Africa has also undertaken a high-level screening study of the energy provision at their processing plant in Harare.

PV Africa worked with Miro Forestry to deliver renewable power generation at Miro’s operations in Sierra Leone and Ghana. As part of this work, Power Ventures Africa has been contracted by the UK government investment arm, CDC, to carry out a feasibility study on options for the supply of power to Miro’s operations in Sierra Leone in the short, medium and long term, leveraging any renewable resources available. The study addresses technical viability, operability, flexibility, environmental impact and life-cycle economics, and then provides recommendations, technical specification and fully costed investment plan.

PV Africa will work with Miro to implement the recommendations of the study, and put in place renewable systems that provide Miro with a power supply system that meets the company's immediate and long-term power needs.

The German development agency GIZ supported the installation of a seed cleaning processing unit for the Kulumsa Agricultural Research Centre (KARC), close to Assela, Ethiopia. Although grid electricity is available, the current plan is to install a diesel generator to ensure a stable and constant power supply for the cleaner. Significant reductions in the costs of photovoltaics over the last ten years make PV systems economically viable for such applications with significant additional benefits of resilience, lower maintenance and smaller carbon footprints.

PV Africa therefore undertook a feasibility study of the options to install a PV system at KARC, either as a replacement for the diesel generator or in parallel to it as a hybrid system, possibly including some battery storage. The study also considered the potential to expand the system to provide power to other loads at the centre such as irrigation and offices.

GreenPath is a specialty food company that produces and sources premium, organic food products. They work with a network of smallholder Partner Farmers in Southern Ethiopia and connect their produce to international markets. GreenPath is Ethiopia's first and only organic certified fruit & vegetable company, under the EU Organic standard.

PV Africa financed the installation of new solar irrigation equipment for GreenPath's network of smallholder farmers. The deal, which was the first of its kind in Ethiopia, allowed GreenPath to spread the cost of implementing a solar irrigation system over 3 years, which helped to boost their short-term growth.

PV Africa is working with africaJUICE, a major agro-processing company in Ethiopia, to support its plans to develop a network of outgrower farmers. The majority of farmers around africaJUICE do not have access to irrigation, and rely on rainfed agriculture. Even though a move to growing fruit under irrigation for supply to africaJUICE would substantially increase their incomes, farmers do not have the resources to invest in the required infrastructure. PV Africa and africaJUICE are therefore developing models that see the installation of solar irrigation systems that would be repaid once the farmers start to earn income from fruit supply to africaJUICE.

PV Africa is supported by GET.Invest: GET.invest is a European programme which supports investments in renewable energy, supported by the European Union, Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Austria.

The team behind PV Africa has Developed the following projects over the last Decade:

Private sector financed PV IPP in Iraq (50MW)
Project development, design and management of tendering process. Private sector financed PV project in Jordan (8MW)
Project development, tendering, contracting and construction supervision.
SME PV project in Zimbabwe (8MW)
Feasibility study on implementation of 8MW of PV systems for a major SME across a number of locations in Zimbabwe. Tendering, contract negotiation and contractor management for the first phase of 1.5MW has now been completed.
SME renewables project Sierra Leone (3MW)
Feasibility study for international SME with fully off-grid operations in Sierra Leone to develop energy strategy based on PV and biomass generation. Tendering and contracting of first phase of 500kW PV.
Private sector financed PV IPP in Iraq (40MW) Project development of expansion phase.
Private sector financed PV IPP in Gaza (20MW) Project development.
Canada-govt funded PV project in Jordan (8MW)
Project development, tendering, contracting and construction supervision.
European government PV project in Ethiopia (50kW)
Feasibility study for a European government facility in Addis Ababa including development of contracting strategy.
AfDB-backed solar IPP in Senegal (20MW)
Part of team delivering business plan, contract negotiation, and political risk insurance.

Power Ventures Africa Team

Andrew Gaines

Andrew has more than a decade of experience working on power, agriculture and manufacturing businesses throughout Africa. Prior to founding Power Ventures Africa, Andrew co-founded DeRisk Advisory Services, a London-based agent for the World Bank Group’s political risk insurance agency, MIGA. Andrew has also worked with Accenture (UK) and Credit Suisse (Switzerland), and holds an MBA from HEC Paris and a BA from Pepperdine University.

Lucas robinson

Lucas has been running businesses and projects in frontier markets for over 20 years. He also has extensive experience in managing the interface with development finance institutions and aid agencies, having previously worked for the UK’s Department for International Development and Canada’s International Development Agency. Lucas is a co-founder of Limalimo Lodge (Ethiopia) and holds an MA from George Washington University and a BA from the University of Toronto.

david o'halloran

David has over 20 years’ experience in energy, power and agribusiness, primarily in Africa. He has worked both for multinationals and start-up ventures and focused on initiating and developing new power businesses with the likes of Shell and AES. He co-founded and ran a leading fruit production and processing business, africaJUICE, for which he has raised multiple rounds of debt and equity financing. David holds an MBA from IMD Switzerland and an engineering degree from UCG, Ireland. David is a Chartered Mechanical Engineer and a Fellow of the Institute of Mechanical Engineers, UK.

ian derry

Ian has over 20 years’ international experience in the commercial, public and not-for-profit sectors. He has an extensive background in business development, building partnerships between different sectors and sustainable development strategies. He is a director of BusinessMinds, a company focused on delivering innovative business models for Africa and cofounded and ran africaJUICE, a leading African fruit production and processing business. Ian holds a masters degree in engineering from Cambridge University, UK.

Dr. Iyad M. Muslih Alsartawi

Iyad is a Certified Professional Consultant in Renewable Energy Sector in Jordan. He has over 15 years of experience in providing consulting activities to implement PV and Wind energy systems for local communities in the Middle East. Iyad is widely regarded as an expert trainer in PV sector, having consulted for the Greater Amman Municipality, Jordanian Civil Defenses, and the Arab Renewable Energy Commission (among others). He holds a PhD from West Virginia University, along with an MA and a BEng from the University of Jordan.

JAMES CARNEGIE

James has over 20 years work experience in inclusive agribusiness, natural resource management, and renewable energy. He has worked primarily in Central, East and Southern Africa, with a variety of organisations and most recently with the private sector. James worked with KPMG for eight years, during the company’s management of the £260m Africa Enterprise Challenge Fund with its focus on agribusiness and renewable energy across 26 African countries, and then managed the Southern African region from Zimbabwe, where he is now based. He co-founded the renewable energy business, Zonful Energy, in Zimbabwe and remains an investor and shareholder. James holds an MSc in Agriculture Development from Reading University, UK, a BSc in Crop Science from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, and more recently completed a post graduate Diploma in Monitoring and Evaluation from Stellenbosch University in SA.

WADZANAI CHIGWA

Wadzanai Chigwa is an energy engineer with over 5 years’ experience in renewable energy technologies in Africa. Wadzanai is part of the pool of experts for the UNFCCC under the Ministry of Environment, Climate change, Tourism and Hospitality Industry as a climate change mitigation expert. She holds a Masters in Renewable Energy from Oldenburg Germany University and has a Bachelor’s degree in Fuels and Energy Engineering. She is also holds an Executive MBA with the National University of Science and Technology in Zimbabwe.

Stefano Gambro

Stefano is the co-founder and managing director of Ennoviga Solar Ltd, specialist PV developer recognised as having delivered London’s three largest PV plants (one being Europe’s largest floating PV generator). Ennoviga operates internationally and has worked on projects in the Middle East, SE Asia and throughout west Africa (Mali, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon). Prior to founding Ennoviga, Stefano worked for Shell International, where he held management positions in oil and gas, renewables, corporate strategy and consumer businesses. Stefano is a chartered mechanical engineer (Brunel University, UK) and a member of the Institute of Directors.