By Benson Daniel
West Africa is taking another step towards a more connected electricity market, with more than 4,000 kilometres of high voltage transmission lines now linking the power grids of 15 countries across the region.
The growing network is beginning to change the way electricity moves across national borders. Countries with cheaper or surplus power can increasingly supply neighbours facing shortages, creating room for a regional market rather than leaving each country to solve its electricity problems alone.
Cross border electricity trading now accounts for about eight per cent of power generated in the region, bringing West Africa closer to the 10 to 12 per cent level seen in more integrated electricity markets.
The development is particularly significant for a region where unreliable supply, expensive generation and financially weak utilities have remained persistent obstacles to economic growth.
In several countries, the problem was not necessarily a complete lack of electricity generation. Some had surplus capacity, particularly from hydropower, but lacked the transmission infrastructure and commercial arrangements needed to move that electricity to markets where it was needed.
The regional grid is gradually addressing that gap.
Major transmission projects include the Côte d’Ivoire Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea interconnector, the Guinea Guinea Bissau The Gambia Senegal transmission loop and the Senegal Mali interconnector.
These connections are allowing lower cost electricity, especially hydropower, to reach countries that previously depended more heavily on expensive fuel based generation.
The savings have been significant in some markets.
In Guinea Bissau, the regional transmission loop helped the national utility reduce its generation cost from about 25 US cents per kilowatt hour to roughly 11 US cents. In The Gambia, the utility recorded about 42 per cent in cost savings and returned to profitability.
Liberia and Sierra Leone have also reduced generation costs by between 10 and 20 per cent by importing electricity from Côte d’Ivoire through the regional network.
Beyond the infrastructure itself, the countries are working to build the commercial system needed to make cross border electricity trading routine.
The West African Power Pool and the ECOWAS Regional Electricity Regulatory Authority have been developing a regional electricity market, including a Day Ahead Market that would allow utilities to buy power ahead of time and potentially secure electricity at lower costs.
A major technical milestone came with the completion of the first grid synchronisation trial, which recorded uninterrupted power flows across 12 countries.
The wider objective is to create a power system in which electricity can move more efficiently across borders whenever demand, generation or prices make such transfers commercially viable.
The benefits are already extending beyond electricity supply.
Transmission and related infrastructure projects supported under the regional programme helped provide electricity services to more than three million people in Burkina Faso, Guinea, Liberia, Senegal, Sierra Leone and The Gambia between 2019 and 2025.
The projects have also generated more than 52,000 direct and indirect jobs across engineering, construction, logistics, project management and operations and maintenance.
For West Africa, the bigger prize is not simply having more kilometres of transmission lines. It is the possibility of turning electricity into a genuinely regional commodity.
That would allow countries to rely less on expensive emergency generation, make better use of available renewable resources and give utilities more options when domestic supply falls short.
The transition will not be automatic. Transmission losses, weak utility finances, payment challenges and differences in national regulations remain obstacles that could limit the benefits of regional integration.
Still, the expansion of the network marks a significant shift.
For a region where electricity shortages have often been treated as separate national problems, the emerging grid is creating the infrastructure for a different approach: one in which West African countries can increasingly share power, manage shortages collectively and make better use of the resources already available within the region.
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