Deconstructing the Understanding of Sustainability for Private-led Mini-grid Governance: A Case Study of Nigeria

For the past decade, the dominant technologiesDominant technology for bringing electricity to remote, mid-dense rural areas in Nigeria have been solar mini-grids (MGs)Mini-grid. Their dominant financing scheme has been fully private, wherein companies receive a performance-based finance subsidy. The aim of this article is to assess the sustainabilitySustainability of tackling energy poverty through private-led mini-gridsMini-grid. Electricity infrastructures, and their selected financial schemes, are not only rigid material constructs. They are intertwined with human life, and the way in which they are embedded in a rural area can reinforce or change inequalitiesInequalities. The main methodologyMethodology we employ and adapt is Nayak’s sustainabilitySustainability frameworkFramework for regenerative ecosystemsEcosystem, which provides a holisticHolistic understanding of complex human-technologyTechnology-environment interactionsInteraction. We use his frameworkFramework to scrutinise the sustainabilitySustainability of Nigerian mini-gridMini-grid governanceGovernance. Results from an analysis of four dimensionsDimension demonstrate that three dimensionsDimension perpetuate lock-in effects in unsustainability: energy organisations, governanceGovernance and institutionsInstitutions. The only dimensionDimension that displayed partly sustainable effects was energy productionProduction.