Africa’s Green Economy Summit held in February during the E-Fest in Cape Town, culminated in the sold-out Formula E championship race attended by more than 25-thousand people.
“[This] created that extra kick-start for the much-needed green invasion that our continent needs,” said David Ashdown, CEO of VUKA Group, organisers of the Summit in partnership with e-Movement and Bellcrescent Partners.
“It was a great success. Besides the various presentations and discussions, we had entrepreneurs pitching projects to investors at our pitch deck lounge, and our concierge match-making service set up in excess of 120 meetings, with one project securing $2 million in seed funding on the day.
“That is the excitement of creating a deal-making environment. We’ve created a very robust platform to build from for the future,” said Ashdown.
With a jam-packed programme of more than 80 expert speakers, Africa’s Green Economy Summit (AGES) brought together financiers, project developers, and government representatives, highlighting investment prospects that exist across the continent in the fields of green hydrogen, EVs, energy storage, solar, hydro and wind energy, infrastructure development, urban sustainability as well as manufacturing.
Cape Town and Western Cape proud hosts
As host province of the event during a week that loadshedding continued to cause problems for South African households and businesses alike, the Western Cape government had a strong presence at Africa’s Green Economy Summit (AGES).
This included the Western Cape Premier Alan Winde who took every opportunity to explain the steps that the local government was taking to alleviate the effects of the current electricity crisis on consumers and businesses as well as providing opportunities for investment in the local green economy.
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“Cape Town was proud to host Africa’s Green Economy Summit,” says the city’s Executive Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis. “We’re on a mission to not only make our city the best and easiest place to do business on the continent, but also to position it as the green economy capital of Africa.
“But building a green economy is about far more than the City’s own energy programme. The opportunities that exist in green hydrogen, energy storage, electric vehicles and a wide range of manufacturing, to name but a few, have the potential to transform our local economy.”
Go Green Africa
Iain Banner, the founder of e-Movement, that brought the Formula E to Africa, was part of the stellar line-up of local, continental and global leaders from the spheres of politics, business and institutions. During the opening session, he announced the launch of Go Green Africa, a collaborative platform to accelerate Africa’s just energy transition.
“No one government, organisation, or individual will ever solve the problem of climate change and environmental damage,” Banner stressed, adding that the South African utility, Eskom, was a founding partner in Go Green Africa and was working with World Bank Funding on one of Africa’s largest battery energy storage projects, highlighting the innovative ways the continent will collaboratively solve its energy access and security problems.
Formula E inspiring example
A real-life inspiring and successful example of how a specific vision and years of patient dedication to the development of green technology can create an entirely new industry was reiterated during a session with the organisers and teams in the Formula E racing competition.
“When we started the Formula E 12 years ago, we had no technology,” Alberto Longo, Co-Founder and CCO of Formula E remembered. Longo was involved in the regular (combustion engine) Grand Prix prior to this venture but increasingly found that sponsors wanted to be involved in greener, more sustainable branding activities.
He explained that during the first four years of the Formula E competition, every team needed two cars to finish a race because of the limited range of the batteries. “Now, step by step, the technology is helping us to have faster and sexier cars, and without the technology we would not be here. Twelve years ago, there were two barriers for EVs, price and range of battery. The cars and batteries are still more expensive but we are getting there.”
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AGES by the numbers
More than 350+ delegates from some 20 countries attended the summit, of whom more than 60 were potential investors and 90 were project developers. The conference sessions provided the insights and discussions of more than 80 high-level speakers and 12 start-up companies and innovators had the opportunity to do project investment pitches in the fields of renewable energy, emobility, manufacturing and infrastructure.
For more information on the project pitches, please download the post-event report on the AGES website and check out the session highlights and speaker interviews.
“We are going on to bigger and better things,” says VUKA Group CEO David Ashdown. “We are back next year, we will be aligned to the Formula E project and the E-Fest series again, there will be an electric vehicle road trip across the country next year, as well connecting to our consumer audience around the E Prix precinct in Green Point.”
The next summit will take place in February 2024, dates to be confirmed.