Nigeria has emerged as sub-Saharan Africa’s fastest-growing market for small-scale solar energy, but weak investment in utility-scale renewable projects is preventing the country’s clean energy boom from strengthening the national electricity grid.
This is according to BloombergNEF’s Sub-Saharan Africa Renewable Energy Market Outlook, which projects that Nigeria will lead the region in rooftop and distributed solar installations through 2035, while South Africa maintains its dominance in large-scale renewable energy development.
The report highlights how unreliable grid electricity, frequent power outages and rising fuel costs are driving Nigerian households and businesses to adopt rooftop solar panels and battery storage systems.
BloombergNEF assessed 16 sub-Saharan African markets using utility-scale project pipelines and clean energy import data to evaluate renewable energy growth across the region.
It found that among the region’s five biggest clean energy equipment importers since 2025—South Africa, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zambia and Kenya—only South Africa, DR Congo and Zambia have substantial utility-scale renewable energy pipelines.
Nigeria and Kenya, the report noted, continue to record growth largely through small-scale solar demand.
According to BloombergNEF, Nigeria currently has about 20 gigawatts (GW) of installed electricity capacity, most of it gas-fired, while solar expansion is occurring almost entirely outside the national grid.
The report estimates that Nigeria added 3.1GW of small-scale solar capacity across 2024 and 2025, bringing cumulative installed capacity to around 6GW.
It forecasts Nigeria’s cumulative solar capacity could reach 87GW by 2035, with annual installations increasing from 2.4GW in 2026 to 7.8GW by 2030 and 16.2GW by 2035.
BloombergNEF attributed the rapid expansion to worsening electricity shortages, higher petrol and diesel prices and growing demand for reliable power among homes and businesses.
“Small-scale solar and storage additions are a key driver of growth across sub-Saharan Africa,” the report stated, adding that the trend is “particularly concentrated in Nigeria, where there is an ongoing shift away from backup petrol generators to solar-plus-storage.”
The report said Nigeria’s experience closely mirrors Pakistan, where consumers have increasingly embraced rooftop solar to compensate for unreliable electricity supply.
Despite the surge in distributed solar adoption, BloombergNEF noted that Nigeria’s utility-scale renewable energy sector remains largely stagnant.
Only two major grid-connected renewable projects were commissioned between 2020 and 2025—the 70MW Zungeru hydropower-linked solar project and the 10MW Kumbotso Solar Plant, the country’s first grid-connected solar facility.
Unlike South Africa, which allocates renewable energy projects through competitive procurement programmes, Nigeria has relied on isolated developments rather than structured auction systems capable of attracting sustained private investment.
BloombergNEF said uncertainty surrounding future renewable energy procurement has discouraged long-term investment.
“These projects were developed sporadically rather than through scalable auction schemes, and there is little clarity on the timing of future tenders,” the report stated.
Meanwhile, South Africa continues to widen the gap in utility-scale renewable energy deployment. BloombergNEF projects the country will increase annual renewable energy additions from an average of 2GW between 2020 and 2025 to 4.67GW annually between 2025 and 2030, supported by government procurement programmes and corporate power purchase agreements.
The report identified the absence of a transparent procurement framework as Nigeria’s biggest obstacle to attracting large-scale renewable energy investment.
It warned that without reforms to electricity procurement, investment will continue flowing into off-grid and mini-grid solutions rather than large renewable projects capable of strengthening the national grid.
BloombergNEF also ranked Nigeria as the region’s second-largest importer of clean energy equipment.
Between 2025 and April 2026, the country imported about 2,370MW worth of solar panels, batteries and related technologies, trailing only South Africa’s 5,416MW.
However, despite the strong import volumes, Nigeria recorded virtually no utility-scale renewable energy financing during the same period, highlighting the growing gap between rising consumer demand and investment in large electricity infrastructure.
Across sub-Saharan Africa, BloombergNEF estimates that 13GW of solar, wind and battery capacity was installed in 2025, with the market expected to expand to 29GW by 2030.
The report concluded that while Nigeria’s clean energy transition is gathering pace, meaningful improvements in electricity supply will depend on reforms that encourage utility-scale renewable energy investment alongside the country’s rapidly growing off-grid solar market.
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