Energy storage power supply of EK in Benin

Benin is reliant on electricity imports for a significant share of its energy supply. Reform programmes, including plans for electrification, have been put in place in the country, where only 30% of the population had access to electricity in 2017.

Benin belongs to several institutions like West Africa (WA), the African Union (AU), the World Trade Organization (WTO), ECOWAS, and WAEMU, and has a total installed energy capacity at 349 MW, with estimated electricity needs at 600 MW, given rapidly growing electricity demand, according to the West African Development Bank (BOAD, 2019) .

Fig. 8 shows that Benin is an energy importer, and very vulnerable in terms of its electricity supplies. Since 1990, between 75% and 99% of its electricity supply was imported, and imports grew sharply from 2007 to 2013, given exponential demand and little national production.

Electricity production using biomass in Benin was zero, similar to other WAEMU member countries, except for the Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso, which accounted for 53.4% and 46.6% of all electricity production (114.5 GWh), using biomass in 2018, respectively.

In 2015, Benin was energy and electrically dependent at 41.3% and 76%, respectively, which worsened given energy imports at 1319.45 GWh in 2018 relative to 1202.15 GWh in 2017, an 8.07% increase due to a 76.80% drop in national electricity production in this period.

Despite significant potential and enthusiasm for using biogas in Benin to produce electricity, biogas processes take time to develop, and can face some challenges, like organic material management (collection and storage), technical controls and equipment maintenance (flammable and corrosive gas production), and the high domestic costs .