Lighting up Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone set out to reach 92% electricity access by 2030. VIDA runs the national platform where that plan comes together.
| Industry | Renewable energy |
| Infrastructure type |
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| Risk types |
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| Location | Sierra Leone (country-wide for 21,000 locations) |
| Users |
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| VIDA value |
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| Impact | Expediting renewable energy access for 6 million people |
In 2021, only 25% of Sierra Leone’s population had access to electricity. Limited energy access holds back economic development, blocks essential services, and reduces quality of life. The government set an ambitious target: electricity access for 92% of the population by 2030. Reaching it means making the right infrastructure choice, grid extension, mini-grid, or standalone solar, for thousands of communities at once.
VIDA set up and runs the national electrification platform for Sierra Leone. Our data covers more than 21,000 settlements across the country: where people live, how many buildings stand in each settlement, how far the grid reaches, and what each community needs. The Ministry of Energy uses this picture to plan the most appropriate energy infrastructure for every settlement, and to plan energy, healthcare, and education infrastructure in an integrated way rather than in silos.
More than 60 decision-makers from the Government of Sierra Leone, the World Bank, the EU, and infrastructure developers collaborate in the same workspace, supported by regular training from the VIDA team. One shared picture replaces scattered spreadsheets, which is what moves a national plan from paper to procurement.
“In a very short while, VIDA has helped us with our National Electrification Planning and our collaboration with them has been beneficial to the energy sector, to private investors, independent power producers and the Government of Sierra Leone”. Cyril Grant, Executive Technical Adviser to the Minister of Energy Sierra Leone
Planning is the first step: see how governments track delivery in Monitoring