energy development in coming years, unfortunately, sub-saharan countries will struggle to meet the energy needs of their people unless they can find ektive new policies, technologies and investment most importantly to spur sustained energy development. while 950 million people in africa, according to iea, will gain access to electricity between now and 2040, over half a billion will still lack it. if i turn to oil development in africa, sub-saharan africa has long been an important player in the global oil market and its role will only grow in coming years. oil production in the region has doubled since 1990 and now accounts for 6% of global production and in addition sub-saharan africa accounted for almost 30% of oil and gas discoveries over the last five years. sub-saharan african oil production is projected to grow from 5.3 million barrels a day

in 2013 to approximately 6.2 million barrels a day by 2020. at present more than 80% of current production is exported, but with economic growth drive g ing demand for oil and oil product in sub-saharan africa we expect it will shift to much greater domestic use. on the natural gas front, major new discoveries are generating excitement in global markets and will be -- will provide fuel for africa's growing economies. among the countries with the most important emerging gas developments are mozambique, tanzania, uganda and madagascar where there have been major progress steps made for commercial development of newly discovered sources in recent years. in the power sector electrification rates in sub-saharan africa are unfortunately among the lowest in the world as has been noted. north africa, by contrast, has

electrification rates of over 99%, but in sub-saharan africa, the rates are average, only 32%, meaning that more than 620 million people lack access to modern energy services. and as the chairman so rightly and appropriately noted, this translates into very concrete impacts on people's livelihoods and indeed their lives. with this context in 2013 when president obama underscored the commitment by launching the power africa initiative. he also asked for the engagement by the department of energy and so in june of this year secretary moniz together with his ethiopian counterpart the minister of energy and water convened a u.s. africa energy ministerial. it drew together 500 participants, 42 african countries, all the relevant pieces of the u.s. government,

20 ministers from across northern and sub-saharan africa and importantly both african and u.s. companies along with civil society academia and other organizations. we focused on clean energy technologies increased power generation, rural electrification and regional power pools, oil and gas development, policy and regulatory issues, investment opportunities and the requirements for finance. in the wake of the african ministerial, the department of energy is working with africa's leading economies to help them meet their energy development goals. i'd like to give a couple of quick examples of work we're doing. in the renewable energy arena, our national renewable energy laboratory is working with angola's ministry of energy and water to deliver -- train the trainer program which will help to make available more

photovoltaic systems in angola. doe is working with a number of west african countries through the economic community of west african states to develop and efficient lighting policymaker's tool box. this will bring together information on lighting standards and labeling and can help raise energy efficiency across that entire region. in the natural gas arena, in addition to working with the government of tanzania to develop natural gas training for university students and government officials, my counterparts, the acting assistant secretary for fossil energy will travel to a series of sub-saharan african countries in early 2015 in order to engage on the policy environments that are taking shape in some of

these critical frontier countries. the department of energy has a strong interest to forge closer links between and among our counterpart u.s. government agencies and african governments. we also feel it absolutely essential in view of the investment needs to work very closely with u.s. companies. we bring to the table particular expertise in regard to energy technologies, markets and policy, and we view this as a strategic opportunity for the united states, for our companies and also for our partners in africa. so the bottom line is this -- energy is the cornerstone of an african strategy for poverty reduction and economic growth where my colleagues on the panel are more expert, to be sure. d.o.e., for its part, however, recognizes that economic growth is closely linked, intimately linked to the availability of energy services to meet the

needs of african companies and citizens. that is why we are working with private sector and public sector partners both in the united states and across africa to help africa unleash its full energy potential for the benefit of african citizens and also for the benefit of the united states. thank you very much for the opportunity to be here today. >> thank you so very much. mr. postal. >> thank you, chairman smith, ranking member bass, members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. president obama's power africa initiative and the leadership of congress including members of the subcommittee highlight the extent the lack of access to electricity. as all of you have noted, without a dependable supply of electricity and an enabling

policy environment, the private sector will not invest significantly in african economies and without private sector investment local economies, entrepreneurs and citizens cannot thrive. power africa, by a dozen government agencies is working to address this obstacle. today more than 80 private sector partners have committed to invest over $20 billion in power sector development. power africa has already helped close deals that will generate more than 3,000 megawatts of energy providing power for more than 5 million african homes and businesses. for example, with our support, the nigerian government privatized five generation and ten distribution companies. these companies, in addition to other planned investments and privatizations are expected to produce 8,000 additional megawatts of power in the coming years. at the same time, another member

of the power africa team, the overseas private investment corporation has already committed $410 million in financing and insurance to private sector partners projects. for example, its $250 million financing for the lake trakana wind farm in kenya will become the continent's largest wind farm when it is complete. power africa focus countries have committed to undertake tough policy reforms in their energy sectors. in august, the millennium challenge corporation, mcc, signed a compact to invest up to $498 million in ghana's electricity sector. this compact includes tough policy reforms needed to create a viable, sustainable energy sector in order to stimulate private investment. power africa has so far been able to catalyze commitments in

excess of $4 billion for the development of ghana's energy sector. power africa's successes extend to u.s. companies as well. for example, general electric is one of the companies making commitments in that ghana situation that i just described. as another example, during meetings in a nigerian trade mission to the united states that was hosted by the u.s. trade and development agency, these discussions enabled a company called itron, a company based in liberty lake, washington, to sell nearly $400,000 worth of electricity meters to nigerian distribution utilities. and they're discussing right now another order worth upwards of $2.6 million. there's a u.s. tda sponsored follow-on activities plan that are expected to lead to more sales by u.s. firms. power africa is also

facilitating investment in the small scale energy solutions that are so crucial to reaching rural communities with no access to the national grids. in september, the african development foundation and its partners chose 22 winners of power africa's off-grid challenge, a competition that promotes innovative solutions for off-grid energy. in another small scale project with an outside impact and an example of something that one of you mentioned, power africa is funding the procurement of generators for an ebola treatment unit and other facilities in liberia that will power water pumps, lights and even the washing machines used to clean health workers' hospital scrubs. some of these basic building blocks that we need to help defeat this epidemic at its source. at this year's african leaders summit, as mentioned, president obama renewed our commitment to

the initiative and pledged to seek a new funding level of up to $300 million in annual assistance to expand the reach of power africa across the continent in pursuit of a new aggregate goal of 30,000 megawatts of additional capacity, thereby increasing access if we hit that goal by up to 60 million households and businesses. other donor partners also seize the opportunity of the summit to announce major new commitments to power africa. today, as noted before 600 million africans don't have access to electricity. together with our partners in congress such as you, our partners in africa, other donor nations and private businesses, power africa is working to greatly increase access to cleaner, reliable energy. thng, mr. chairman, ranking member bass and members of the subcommittee for your support and leadership of this very

important initiative. i look forward to your questions today. >> i would like to yield to dr. ichord. >> thank you, chairman smith, ranking member bass and subcommittee members. i appreciate this opportunity to discuss africa's energy future and how we are using our foreign policy tools to support stability and economic development in africa through increasing access to electricity and laying the groundwork for a stable and prosperous energy sector. i'm here representing the bureau for energy resources at the state department, which focuses on our energy equities around the world and seeks to elevate and integrate the foreign policy. first, i'd like to acknowledge and thank the house for its clean attention to the issue of electricity and poverty in africa by the electrify africa act. clearly africa is going through

a historic transformation and the bureau is working hard to help african governments responsibly develop their conventional and renewable energy resources and to accelerate the reform of their electricity systems which will then encourage private investment and increase electricity access. within our interagency team -- and i should say we have a very strong interagency team. one of the strongest in my 40 years in government in terms of working on these issues. within that framework the energy bureau is focused on three main areas. one, promoting good governance as it relates to managing oil and gas resources but this is also very important for the electricity sector as well. second, increasing access to electricity and third, increasing renewable technologies. let me turn to governance. it's key security as well as economic concerns, poorly managed resources can stifle

development and feed corruption. with the goal of helping countries avoid these issues our energy governance capacity initiative offers governments on the ground technical assistance and training both in the region and the united states on some of the most difficult issues facing this sector. for instance, management of revenues, incorporation of best practices into laws and regulations, protecting people and environment from sector impacts. under the program we're currently engaged with liberia, sierra leone, somalia, tanzania and the serb seychelles. it has global and regional significance and we'll be looking at ways that we can ensure their sound development. transparency is a key to good

governance. we're actively involved in the initiative eiti, to support transparency and accountable management of natural resources. through eiti representatives of government, civil society industry and government work together to produce reports that disclose information about a country's natural resource revenues allowing the citizens to see how much their natural resources are worth and how they're used. currently there are 18 countries in africa that are eiti compliant and four are eiti candidate countries. clearly we've heard about the statistics on the extent of energy poverty in africa. and we're not only working through power africa, but we're involved in multilateral efforts such as sustainable energy for all initiative of the united nations and world bank. we're helping to track investment needed to expand energy transmission and

distribution, all key sectors. as an active participant in the team focus on the policy framework for the reforms necessary to improve the enabling environment and reduce the risk to investors. through our systemic engagement with our embassies the state department is working to ensure that the transactions that the emphasis of power africa leads to changes that will encourage even more investment. we've positioned a senior career foreign service officer in the region who is working to enhance our diplomatic efforts while minimizing costs. we're planning regional training sessions that will upgrade the energy, knowledge and skills of our economic officers in the embassies and in the region. we're very excited about the beyond the grid initiative that sub initiative that is part of power africa, and we're working

globally as well as in africa in looking at promising business and technology models that will help provide energy access to rural populations. and we've helped forge a link recently between power africa and the sustainable energy for all initiative with its goal of universal electricity access for the 1.2 billion people around the world in sub-saharan africa that don't have access to electricity by 2030. very ambitious goal but one that's very consistent with the electrify africa and our power africa objectives and where the european union is making large commitments to increase electricity in africa. the power sector program provides expert advice to help strengthen the south africa power pool and the association of energy regulators that oversee this developing market. we see regional power pools as critical to larger markets that can tap the resources in africa.

we have our unconventional gas program that's working with countries to help them look at the potentials for their unconventional natural gas resources and do so in a sustainable and safe manner. we're working with many partners around the world, for instance, the international renewable agency that has a strong emphasis in africa and our initiatives will link with many of theirs and improve the synergy with power africa. in conclusion, mr. chairman, sub-saharan africa stands at a crossroads. expansive renewable resources and an emerging oil and gas sector will either be an integral part of bringing light to the continent and lifting it out of poverty or be a catalyst for instability and corruption. we feel the administration and congress have a historic opportunity to engage in the spectrum to address these challenges. i look forward to your questions. thank you very much.

>> thank you very much for your testimony. i'd like to begin with just a few questions, then yield to my distinguished colleagues. let me ask you, first of all, what african countries have prioritized electrification? if you can go through some of those countries and what are some of the obstacles and challenges that we and others are facing in trying to assist. are the u.s. and other investments meeting the challenge or are there gaps? has enough been allocated to this endeavor to make it happen sooner rather than later? operationally, is the emphasis on national governments or state governments or both and local? if you find a national government that's unwilling to be as transparent as we would want them to be, do we look to by pass and go to a state because obviously in the u.s. it's the states and local governments that carry the heavy burden of providing electricity. is that model being applied in africa?

in terms of the electrification, obviously we have state of the art electrification here and i've visited virtually every electricity plant in my state, most of them, not all of them, over the years. and they obviously have many environmental safeguards. scrubbers when it's coal to make sure that what comes out the chimney does not lead to disasters health wise because of pollution. are those kinds of environmental sustainable best practices being incorporated in what we do? seems to me there's so much on the shelf capability and knowledge that it would be a shame if that was lost. if you can spend a moment on that as well. how are and where are the african power leaders, especially the equivalent to the nco core, the people that actually run the generators, and where do they get their education? are they partnering with electricity companies here or, you know, is it something that they're picking up in college, junior college? who is training those who will

run the plants so they'll be run safely and effectively. the beyond the grid initiative under power africa is intended to facilitate investment in small scale energy solutions. do you think such projects would interest more african entrepreneurs to take a greater interest in creating means to supply energy to underserved communities in africa? if you could speak to those questions, i would appreciate it. >> thank you for your questions, mr. chairman, and thank you for your leadership on this entire topic and introducing the legislation. so each country is in a different place, but we've seen a number of countries really focus on increasing electrification. you see this, for example, as witnessed in the mcc compacts in tanzania and ghana. both governments have realized that the lack of electricity is holding back their growth.

and there are a number -- i won't go through the whole list, but there are a number of countries realizing how important this is to their growth, to their health care system, to their education system and are looking to really do a lot more in this area. there are gaps. and that's part of the concept behind power africa is to identify what the gaps are and work with the governments and the private sector investors to try to solve them. we have seen cases where private sector investors from the united states and elsewhere have tried to do deals, then they run into a roadblock. that's where the transaction advisers step in and say, okay, how do we solve that. >> on the gaps issue, is that something you could summarize and provide to the subcommittee so we get a sense of what you are truly encountering? >> yes, we can. >> we can try to be helpful with those governments. >> we can do that. in terms of local and national

governance, obviously, there are often national policies that set the energy policy and the tariffs for the entire country but there are a number of local aspects that also come to play. and we work with all of them in this same roadblock approach to try to figure out what are the challenges and how we deal with that. the question of environmental and social safeguards is very important, and you're absolutely right. we don't need to reinvent the wheel. we need to make sure that we use state of the art and so all the projects, for instance, if there's a component that involves the development banks, each one of those banks has their own policy for checking these things and working with the governments and making sure that the projects fit those standards and don't introduce some really poor practices. in terms of the education and

training, there are local institutions that offer in some countries training, in other cases people have education from the united states or europe. but it is an area where there are shortfalls. there's actually a longstanding partnership that usaid funds which involves a lot of u.s. utilities and involving u.s. regulators, and they work in combination with people in the individual countries for this very reason so that they could have very technical interactions from one utility technical person to another and to try to increase that skill level because there are definitely gaps and we need to keep working on that. >> those people come here to learn or do our people get deployed there? >> both. >> oh. >> both. >> depending on the circumstances. >> how large of an operation is that? >> it's a modest-sized very economical system where each

year we get requests from different countries and it's not restricted to africa but africa has been a big participant. we look at them and match them up with different utilities. i don't know off the top of my head, but probably a utility in new jersey or california utilities, whatever. but they match them up with utilities that have the expertise that they need. so -- and then they have these exchanges and interactions. >> for the record, could you provide the committee a sense of what that is. >> yes, we can. >> that would be very helpful. >> lastly before i turn to my colleagues absolutely beyond the grid we having local organizations and entrepreneurs seeing the business opportunities is part of the objectives. and that's sometimes where some of the credit guarantees of opic or usaid been help them deal with the risk and introduce them to interesting business opportunities which they know very well because some of these

remote areas, they might know much better than a large company, but i'm sure my colleagues have things to add. >> chairman smith, i would add a couple of points, if i may. first of all, i mean, we all, i think, acknowledge the difficulty of providing broad answers because of the very great diversity of the different circumstances in different african countries and, indeed, rural versus urban settings, but within that -- with that danger, i'll attempt to respond. in regard to the question about cutting edge development of the power systems, the grid centralized systems, one of the areas that we felt is very, very important and that a number of our agencies have worked on have

different vantage points, different perspectives of our different missions is the business of utilization of associated gas from oil development projects. the historical experience of the flaring of natural gas is understandable when infrastructure is lacking but when infrastructure manages to be lacking but for period of time into decades that's really a critical lost opportunity. so one of the things that we have been focusing on in our policy dialogues with african countries and indeed one of the things that we're focusing on at the level of identification of opportunities in certain african countries is this area of gas capture for power generation together with the trade and development agency this summer

the department of energy organized a reverse trade mission that took leaders from a couple of different african countries to the houston, texas, area for a series of meetings with companies involved in gas development, so we think that there's an area for potential opportunity there. in regard to beyond the grid initiative and some of the potential for growth with african entrepreneurs, from the department of energy perspective, one aspect of this that we have been focusing on is the importance of proper performance of products in the marketplace. so it is, of course, easy to spoil the market when you have substandard products be they for

off grid or for solar lanterns, another area where department of energy has worked, and so we are working with our colleagues at a.i.d. in regard to look at how to make sure that off-grid lighting systems and solar systems and hybrid systems that are a mix of renewables and either diesel or natural gas, that these are -- that they actually perform in the way advertised so you see a healthy development of that entrepreneurial opportunity going forward. lastly on the issue of the training, i would say from our perspective, this is an area that is both of huge interest to u.s. companies, but it's also in terms of gas, i mean, lots of shall we say head room, lots of opportunity for growth. i'm sure that members of the

committee have had the experience as i and my colleagues have, for example, as a comparison, of traveling throughout the gulf region and when one is in the kingdom of saudi arabia or the united arab emirates or kuwait, many other countries, where there have been historical very long lasting education and training and company relationships, what that translates into is not only high quality energy development, it also translates into huge opportunity for u.s. companies because, in many cases, our counterparts are familiar with u.s. standards, u.s. approaches, u.s. vendors. so huge opportunity for growth there. it's an area that d.o.e. is looking to try to develop some ideas on. thank you. >> may i make a few -- >> yes. >> i have five points that i'll chime in here on that relate to the gaps and challenges.

the first is in a sense a common problem and throughout the subcontinent is related to the financial position of the utilities. so in a sense one of the challenges is how to strengthen the regulatory environment, the pricing environment and move toward more commercial utilities because then the investors will then know that they have a credible off taker for the power that they're generating. clearly we've done a lot of work to power africa on power purchase agreements, developing standardized approaches, opic has been very important in this area. at the same time you need to have a solvent financially viable energy system in order to have the long-term investment. that's necessary to develop the sector. second is, i think, mr. elkind's point about the integration of gas and the upstream issues with the power sector is a

particularly important challenge. oftentimes have different ministries like a nigeria and you have to in a sense work to help them, the catalyst to try to do better planning so that you can ensure that the oil and gas that's being developed in the country is going to be available to meet the needs of the countries. ghana's a very interesting example where they want to develop a lot of capacity and yet the oil and gas development has been slow in coming. the point about urban and sub national i think is a very important point in africa as well as in other regions. because the urbanization process is creating these centers of buildings and industry, and the mayors and the sub national leaders of those entities are becoming more and more important as this process goes.

and as you know, we've talked about urbanization, but urbanization is still really at embryonic stage in sub-saharan africa, less than 50% and by 2040 you'll have less than 20% urban. working with the cities in the urban areas is a very important area particularly in areas like energy efficiency. fourth area is the entrepreneurial development and local institutions. here i think in many cases, it's very important to work with the local business community which we are and also to focus on how can we develop more capacity and receptivity in the local banking system so that they can lend for some of these projects so it isn't just dependent on international capital coming in because they know that much of the international capital particularly the private and

institutional capital sees huge risk and are very risk adverse in terms of coming into these areas. the local banking sector becomes very important. we've seen in nigeria that the local banking system if developed can play a role. finally i will say there's a lot of actors that are playing in this field. i think it's very important. we are working very closely with the world bank and africa development bank and other donors to try to have a coordinated approach that addresses the range of gaps institutionally and otherwise and that we're trying to leverage our money effectively in that process. >> dr. ichord, thank you very much. ms. bass. >> again, thank you all for your testimony. as i said in my opening statement, i'm a big supporter of power africa, but i want to raise a few issues that are raised by others with concern

about power africa and the implementation. so i believe mr. elkind you were mentioning african entrepreneurs. i i think you mentioned that. i wanted to know to the extent that the african diaspora here in the united states was getting involved or what type of outreach are you doing. so a couple of questions. the african diaspora specifically but also just small businesses. i constantly encounter small businesspeople who want to figure out how to be connected and just can't quite make the connection. you mentioned the reverse trade mission and you mentioned it to houston. i'm wondering if there's any others that are planned. of course i'm going to make a pitch for southern california because it seems like reverse trade missions don't quite make it to the west or maybe i'm just not aware of them. so that's another issue. then i want to ask you about the development of the infrastructure on the continent. so why don't i start with those

couple questions? >> thank you for your questions. i'm sure my colleagues add in. we agree with you that we need to not only start but continue with a lot of outreach to reach all different sectors of interested people, small u.s. businesses, diaspora, large u.s. businesses and so forth. we're making progress, but we have more to do. there are some cases already where there has been diaspora interests. i understand that there is, for instance, an ethiopian american business that's going to be manufacturing smart meters for ethiopia's electricity company. and i hope that there will be additional successes in the days ahead and as you allude to, many members of the diaspora know

very well the business opportunities, and they have, through their own hard work, accumulated capital, so they're ideally suited to participate in different aspects of this. and in terms of it being connected, we have created a one stop shop there on the usaid website there's a page, but in the worst case somebody can send an e-mail, power africa at usaid.gov and we can use that one stop shop to reach out to all the u.s. government entities depending on the circumstances and make the connections. because we have the view that people shouldn't have to hunt all over the u.s. government to figure out who to talk to. that's why we created this one stop shop. we'll direct them and save them that trouble. it shouldn't be that difficult for american taxpayers. >> i really would like to help you with that as well. so maybe reaching out to members of congress others might want to

be involved. the african diaspora as well as african-american diaspora are who interested in participating in power africa. >> we'll take you up on that. >> please do. another issue that came up, it came up when the bill was being heard here in committee, and that is to the extent that we are, you know, in power africa supporting the development of the infrastructure on the continent, so there's some concern from some people that most of the infrastructure is going to be built in cities to help businesses, which is wonderful, but considering that people in the rural areas or even right in the city, in neighborhoods, do not have electricity. what always horrified me was the idea of women giving childbirth using the light on their cell phone to deliver a baby.

so i'm wondering about that. >> let me start. clearly the issues related to the models for rural electrification is changing a lot. i mean it's really a revolution that's occurring in which the drop in prices for solar system s, advances in telecommunication ks and cell phone, i just came back from bangladesh. some of the models and commercial approaches that are being taken i think are going to be extremely important for africa because you have such one large rural populations, two, without access. you have relatively small loads. the economics of extending the grid by utilities that don't have the money to do it. you know, or don't necessarily

have the same kind of commitment to extend the systems because they're in many cases struggling to just meet urban requirements. >> and in urban, i was referring to in neighborhoods. urban communities. >> i think the issues related to decentralized approaches are relevant to some of the urban areas as well as to the rural areas, and i think it was also your question about the entrepreneurial opportunities to work with u.s. companies -- >> right. >> -- who are at the leading edge of these technologies. we're working with a california company that has developed a nano grid approach in bangladesh. and that's the kind of innovation that i see going on with the u.s. companies that we can begin to try to focus on to take a closer look at africa and the market opportunities.

>> so you're telling me that it's a part of the initiative? >> well, i think that's why i say we're excited about beyond the grid because in a sense we're in the early stages here but a lot of companies have come up and expressed interest in involvement, and i think if we get the right strategies we can indeed help accelerate the commercialization of these kinds of options for africa. >> maybe you can another point give me the name of that company in california. so a couple other areas. another area of concern that gets raised a lot is to what extent is power africa looking at renewables. you know, as you know, that's always a controversial issue, whether power africa is just going to focus on fossil fuels. so to what extent? from anybody. then i have one final question after that. >> ranking member bass, thank

you for those questions. just to respond to a couple of the ones that you've posed, first of all, in relation to the reverse trade missions, we'd be happy to go back and talk with our colleagues of trade and development agency that are -- that lead in the organization of them, our agency and others from across the u.s. government typically provide technical depth and some of the relationships with companies that can help to make them most effective but i'll be happy to take away interest, your interest in knowing what more do they have planned over the -- >> good, you're going to tell them to come to los angeles then? >> beg your pardon? >> you'll tell them to come to los angeles? >> i'm told that there's a tda representative in los angeles that is working on an effort called making global local to get reverse trade missions to cities across the united states.

so some of that may, in fact, be happening. >> and i'm sorry. tell me the name of it again. >> making global local. so indeed some of this may be happening. we'll get the details back to you for the record. concerning the role of renewables in power africa, i mean, the first point, the approach that we as an administration are taking is very nonspecific as to technologies. it is -- there are going to be different answers that work in different contexts. the grid is all about opportunities for renewable systems with storage, hybrid systems that involve a mix of renewables and fossil fuel generating capacity for when there is not wind or sunlight. this is one of the things where

one of the area ws where the department of energy is able to make a significant contribution to power africa's capability by providing some of the expertise of our laboratories in these arenas. already i think it is worth calling out that the pledges from private sector partners to the beyond the grid initiative are pretty considerable. more than a billion dollars over the upcoming five years. so while we don't have today specific, you know, long lists of things that have gotten done, we think that this is a very promising area for the growth of power africa and an area where for certain settings, there will be a lot of relevance. last comment, oh, by the way, it is not just the village setting in rural africa where off grid

and micro grid systems are relevant and that is equally true in remote settings in the united states, in alaska, for example, and even for very nonrural settings such as the micro grids separable grid systems thatty a we are looking in places that are very highly urbanized parts of our country where in times of grid instability another commonality with some of the african grid systems. you can island off a particular part of the grid in order to protect critical load. hospitals, transport systems, et cetera. >> thank you. and then -- oh, i'm sorry. go ahead. >> if i may, obviously we know that africa's blessed with world class renewable energy resources. the u.s. is a member of the international agency and what

the arena has been doing is trying to develop more extensive maps of the renewable resource potential throughout africa. this is clearly showing that, in a sense, there's a range of resources, whether geothermal in ethiopia, whether it's wind in kenya or, you know, hydroresources are still very important for the continent and in some cases even solar power for larger grid connected applications. i was struck at the africa ministerial in addis about how consistent the ministers were in stressing the important role that they saw renewables play in a diversified energy mix. so i think that many countries have moved, they moved to develop the incentive frameworks for interconnection of renewable energy. i think in some cases it clearly -- they are looking at a

mix of both renewables and natural gas to have a cleaner fuel systems. and i think that varies widely depending on whether you're talking about north or south or central. >> thank you. is it elkind or elkind. >> it's elkind but i'll answer to anything including hey you. >> just don't call you late for dinner, right? you said in your opening remarks that you went to a meeting where there were about 500 participants. i was just coming in, trying to get situated. where was that? >> thank you for the question. this was the u.s. africa energy ministerial which took place in early june in addis ababa ethiopia. it was hosted by the government of ethiopia, co-chaired by the secretary of energy dr. moniz and the ethiopian minister of

energy and water. >> okay. and then mr. postel? close enough? okay. you said that nigeriahad recently privatized ten distribution companies is that correct? >> correct. >> how long ago was that? >> over the course of the last 12 months. >> over the course of the last 12 months. so the government itself had been running their generation and distribution facilities? >> yes, they had. >> what percentage does that equate to in nigeria, when you said they privatized five in ten. is that half of the facilities, a third? >> i can give you the precise answer off the top of my head i believe it was at least half, if not a bit more. >> so in 12 months, has that been a viable function? are they functioning properly with -- i mean, i own a business, so it's impossible to

do that with any problems. he's grinning like a opossum t eating yellowjackets. so what does that mean? are they operating without problems? >> my colleague dr. ichord has more information that he'll add. but my understanding is each company is in a different situation in the sense that some are operating very well, some a few hiccups but i would characterize them as growing pains, but in general a lot of the operations went forward. >> okay, by the way i do want to add to our ranking member that texas has its own grid. you come to texas 85% of the state is covered by irkats. if you want to get that grid in africa, come see us. next question -- you're stuck on the opossum eating yellowjackets, huh? mr. postel, from my notebook, notes about you, you said that you had developed a plan to

first international securitization of receivables without a corporate guarantee. >> yes, sir. >> explain that.that. >> this was a financing for the government of jamaica in 1988. it was the first new funding that they had obtained from the private sector in something like 13 years, because there had been reschedulings. and basically, every year, they were receiving payments from at&t for telephone calls that they were making to jamaica. and we felt that that was predictable enough to give them the money up-front, in essence, and so we raised money in japan and we did that financing. and it was all repaid. >> can you do the same thing with electrification in africa? >> i'll have to think about that. >> okay. that's what i thought it was.

now, you also, is it eicord, i think you also said in your remarks, governance and transparency were keys to security concerns. protection of the people and the environment from sector impacts. and it should have been -- i think i was writing fast and furiously, although that's a bad term now, isn't it? i was writing quickly. what does that mean? sector impacts? >> well, i think, obviously, the -- as we know from our experience here, the environmental impact of offshore and upstream oil and gas is a very important area to develop the capacity of these countries. and that's really, it was in that context, maybe the sector impacts is a little too vague, but that's what we were -- >> that's what you were -- >> increasing the capacities in the environment management area. >> that's what i was wondering. and then you also said something

about eait extractable? >> yeah, it's an international initiative, the extracktive industries transparency initiative. actually, the interior department in the u.s. has the lead on it's basically to enhance accountability in terms of this important sector and the revenues and -- >> okay, that's going to be important. you said, also, that -- and i don't remember if you said expansive resources and emerging oil and gas resources. quantify that for us percentage wise. 50/50, 60/40? >> well, i think that clearly there are a dozen or more countries where oil and gas is

developing. some are more developed, like angola and nigeria. others where expiration is just beginning, and in the early stages. i think it's a little bit too early to say exactly what that mix will be. you certainly have tanzania and mozambique, where you have in a sense, world scale gas resources that are being developed. and that will then open up lots of opportunities for them to have a significant gas role in their economies. at the same time, for the electric power sector, the economics of many of these renewable energy resources look very attractive, especially compared to oil. which many of the countries are still -- having to use oil to generate and have cost of, you know, 30 cents a kilowatt hour for power, like in ghana, which has to use oil because they're not able to get gas from nigeria

in the pipeline. >> so i looked at a map of africa, doing a search for pipeline infrastructure, and it looks like most, what a limited pipeline infrastructure they had was primarily in the north, i don't know if you're familiar with that map or not. >> well, they have the west africa pipeline and that is -- >> runs from algeria to nigeria. >> that's right. >> so the problem has been that nigh jaerya has a severe gas shortage because the internal policies haven't been given the incentives for the development of their gas resources, therefore countries like ghana and others on the pipeline route have not been able to get the gas supplies through that pipeline. >> is there a robust pipeline industry and/or association in africa that's pushing for the installation of pipelines and do we have property rights and how does that play if there is? >> thank you, congressman.

however, there is, i think, a natural, unavoidable tension that will have to play out here, and that frankly was at one of the really core elements of our discussion in june at the ministerial meeting i just referred to in response to your question. and that is, as one sees development of the oil and gas resources, particularly in some of the frontier provinces, east africa in particular, how much of that is for domestic consumption versus export? and i mean, the international oil companies want to meet demand in the countries where they operate, because that's then, you know, that has a multiplier effect that is very, very beneficial for many of those companies, but they also need predictability in terms of offtake arrangements. so to your question, is there a robust existing vision, i would say, no.

there is a great deal of interest and some fairly elaborate, fairly ambitious ideas, goals, in terms of development of east african gas pipelines, for example, to take gas to power generation in south africa, from mozambique, as in tanzania, one big example. but the open issue, which has still not yet played out, is whether the steps can be put in place with the right policies, the right laws, that give the investors enough predictability so that they will put down, you know, tens and tens of billions of dollars for really, you know, multi-decade investment projects. >> well, that brings me to -- well, i've got a question about

ranking of the most favorable countries, because, clearly, some countries are going to be good, better candidates than others on investing into infrastructure. but before i go there, mr. elkind, you also said that you all had a focus on performance of products in the market place, making sure offgrid systems actually perform. now, when you say an offgrid system, describe one of those to us. >> yes, sir. so a small household or village level system that might include one or more solar panels, perhaps paired with either storage capacity, battery systems or a fossil fuel, a

diesel or other fossil fuel generating system to use when the sun is not up, the wind is not blowing, that through to highly efficient lamps, refrigeration for food and medicine, those kind of applications. >> so is that to say if someone has a house out there with solar panels, that there's going to be an effort to have regulatory rules in place, that they have to meet in certain efficiency requirements? >> no, sir. the point here is that if -- there are lots of examples of one can see, for example, in solar lanterns, where there were products, there are products that are being sold into a number of marketplaces, including a number of the african countries, where the claims for the performance of the product simply don't match

what the product actually does. you know, in our context, we call that, you know, false advertising. so when the countries are saying, how do we think about the technical challenge of knowing what a product actually does what it says, that's an area where we have experience in the united states and can help to make that experience available. again, it's at their request, and the point is not to allow fraudulent claims in the market place. >> well, the last thing, and i don't mean to speak for it, but apparently one of the things you can say is the last thing you want to happen that as they're developing these markets, they get burned with bad products and they just say, they don't work, forget it, never mind. all right, now is there any -- i guess all three of you, i'll let my last question that i alluded to earlier, a ranking of the most favorable countries. i mean, i'm going to have to believe, and y'all have done a lot of thought on this, i

haven't, but just at a glance, there are going to be a lot of factors that are going to influence whether they're a good candidate. population, topography, gas, oil palestine availability, educational resources. do you have that workforce that you can come in there and you can train how to do this? and then, of course, i mentioned earlier, property owners, you know, ownership. can you own property. is there a system in place to take over, you know, to condemn property, if you will, for a pipeline -- i mean, right away, which there is. the timing, is it right for the country. the stability? is the government still -- is it a stable system of government? so those are just seven things i came up with. do you rank countries, which would be the best candidates for investment in their infrastructure? >> congressman, thank you for your question, andt