The power infrastructure in South Sudan is under-developed and so weak that it can’t meet our nation’s growing energy demand. Large majority our population depend on traditional biomass fuels such as wood, charcoal, crop residue and animal dung to provide their cooking and heating energy needs. Roughly 1 percent of our estimated 12.5 million people can access electric grid at shockingly high prices for a very unreliable service. Today, many people use rooftop solar arrays and noisy and environmentally unfriendly diesel generators to light their houses and shops.

Hydropower: The River Nile presents many opportunities for hydropower generation from large plants to small hydro. Here are the existing plants: Fula (1,080 MW), Bedden (720 MW), Lekki (420 MW), Shukoli (250 MW) and Juba barrage (120 MW) (ROSS, 2014). The SDP government shall work in coorperation with private investors to encourage development of those hydro plants to higher capacity as well as investing in more hydro plants across the country for more efficient means of enabling access to electricity to the many communities scattered around the country. Hydroelectricity should be the baseload for South Sudan and therefore more investment in it, is necessary.

Wind: There is plenty of wind in South Sudan and therefore there is a need to attract private investment to develop this sector for rural electrification where distributed systems can easily be utilized.

Solar: South Sudan has about 8 hours of sunshine per day. This can be successfully used to support electrification in the rural areas as well. The Sunrise Democratic Party’s government will work with private investors to increase the use of the country’s high potential for solar energy to meet the country’s energy demand.

Gas and Geothermal are other potential energy sources that should be utilized for South Sudan to meet its energy demand. All this means economic growth and more job opportunities for our citizens.