Staff Writer
The Africa Energy Week (AEW) 2022 will hold a dedicated Green Hydrogen Summit, where emerging hydrogen economies such as Namibia will play a leading role in shaping dialogue around this critical resource.
The summit in October in Cape Town, South Africa represents the official platform, not just for a discussion on the challenges and opportunities across Africa’s future hydrogen market, but for global investors and international private sector companies to be introduced to African opportunities, the organisers of the summit, Africa Energy Chamber says in a statement issued on Thursday.
AEW 2022 aims to integrate private sector know-how with public sector opportunities and will do so through forums such as this.
The President’s Economic Advisor and Hydrogen Commissioner, James Mnyupe together with other energy experts from Namibia will be the main focus at the October event.
Mnyupe will be the new kid on the block at Africa’s biggest energy symposium where intersection of energy investment and socioeconomic development as well as the role of green hydrogen will play in Namibia’s energy mix and economic future will be discussed.
In the media release, Mnyupe is described as having help shaped ‘’Namibia’s economic developmental agenda, with the country kick-starting a growth plan centered around five key sectors. At COP26 in Glasgow in 2021, Namibia announced that the country will be targeting the development of the steel industry, transportation industry, power sector, agriculture industry and hydrogen industry with major developments already underway across all these sectors’’.
The statement says Namibia has significant renewable energy potential and a favourable regulatory environment, and is well positioned to become a green hydrogen economy.
‘’The country’s biggest hydrogen project, the US$9.4 billion green hydrogen project located in the Tsau//Khaeb National Park in southern Namibia, represents a turning point for the country’s energy sector,’’ the continental chamber says.
The hydrogen sector has seen significant investment commitments that have kick-started large-scale project developments across the country and following a competitive tender process in 2021, the government of Namibia announced the selection of project development company Hyphen Hydrogen Energy as the preferred bidder for the construction of the project.
The capacity of the project is estimated at 300,000 tons per year of green hydrogen and green ammonia, and is set to transform the country’s economy while emphasizing Africa’s potential as the next global hydrogen producer, the statement continues.
According to NJ Ayuk, the executive chairman of Africa Energy Chamber, Mnyupe has done a lot to convince him and many at the Chamber on Hydrogen playing a role in Africa’s energy mix.
“We have toured Europe together on Hydrogen thanks to the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, the EU commission and the German government. At the African Energy Chamber (AEC), we firmly believe in the role hydrogen will play in transforming African economies. As the continent moves to transition to cleaner sources of fuel in its own strategic manner, green hydrogen will play a central role in improving energy security, driving socioeconomic growth and making energy poverty history by 2030, while at the same time decarbonizing the energy sector,” says Ayuk.
The chamber says, Namibia has made a name for itself in 2022 as both a hydrocarbon hotspot and emerging green hydrogen market and during AEW 2022, the successes seen across the country as well as future project pipelines, announcements and deals will be brought to the table.
Under the theme, “Exploring and Investing in Africa’s Energy Future while Driving an Enabling Environment,” AEW 2022, the statement says, unites the entire African energy sector including public and private sector executives, government representatives and ministers, and policymakers and financiers for four days of networking and insight on the future of African energy.
