Climate Financing Options: An Assessment for Columbia World Project -- Ghana Household Energy
By Ama Francis
This report was prepared for Columbia World Project: Ghana Household Energy (“the Project”) in order to identify climate finance options that would provide substantial additional funding for Project implementation. The Project will advance in two major stages. Phase 1 will identify policy measures and fuel options that will effectively promote community-level adoption of clean cooking technologies. Phase 2 will then implement the intervention based on findings from Phase 1. The funding this Project seeks will cover Phase 2 operations costs and likely contribute to subsidizing the cost of fuel and hardware in order to reduce the consumer end-price of the clean cooking technology this Project promotes.
The report identifies three potential sources of climate finance: 1) Carbon Finance; 2) the NAMA Facility; and 3) the Green Climate Fund (GCF). Carbon finance would provide the greatest amount of university ownership over the Project, and support a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG)-based intervention if Phase 1 identifies LPG as one of the fuel sources most likely to achieve a transition to clean cooking. However, the Project would not be able to generate funds from carbon finance before Phase 2, since Phase 2 itself would produce carbon credits for sale. Therefore, another financing source, outside carbon trading, is necessary to support Phase 2 implementation.
The NAMA Facility and GCF both offer the Project an opportunity to leverage climate financing to drive Phase 2, and also seek funding of at least USD$5 million that could support a national-scale intervention. A proposal to both the NAMA Facility and GCF would require endorsement from the Ghanaian government. Therefore, securing buy-in from the Government of Ghana is imperative if the Project is to successfully obtain climate finance through these channels in advance of Phase 2. Both pathways would allow the Project to ensure more lasting structural change by partnering with the Government of Ghana.
This report focuses on climate finance as an innovative way to overcome barriers clean cooking enterprises typically face. The report highlights carbon finance, the NAMA Facility, and the GCF as promising mechanisms because of their alignment with the Project timeline, past support of clean cooking interventions, and ability to provide at least USD$5M. However, funding options outside of climate finance could be explored, including support from private foundations. Regardless of the pathway, identifying innovative ways to financially back clean cooking interventions in Ghana is important, and access to large-scale, sustained financing could be transformative.
Read the report Climate Financing Options: An Assessment for Columbia World Project – Ghana Household Energy in Columbia Law School's Scholarship Archive.