West Africa Needs Strong Infrastructure Base To Deliver Sustainable Electricity

Strong infrastructure base has been identified as key to improving energy efficiency and sustainability in West Africa whose electricity demand is growing rapidly.

Meeting this demand growth will depend on fuel availability and infrastructure, according to S&P Global Energy report.

Across West Africa, gas-fired power plants will remain central to incremental supply and system reliability, making fuel availability a key constraint on electricity-sector growth.

West Africa’s gas story is more clearly one of deliverability than resource scarcity, it says.

According to S&P, Nigeria, Senegal, Mauritania, Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire possess substantial resources, but future gas-to-power growth will depend on developing upstream production, pipelines, LNG infrastructure and power generation in step.

It said Nigeria sits at the center of that system, hosting sub-Saharan Africa’s most developed gas value chain, accounts for more than half of regional gas sales and is Africa’s largest LNG exporter outside North Africa. Its gas resources are estimated at about 190 trillion cubic feet, equivalent to roughly 60 years of production at current rates.

Nigeria also possesses the region’s most extensive gas transmission network. Existing systems connect producing areas with industrial and power demand centers in both the east and west of the country, while ongoing projects aim to improve nationwide connectivity.

The Obiafu-Obrikom-Oben (OB3) interconnector will link eastern and western networks, while the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) pipeline is designed to support planned power generation and industrial demand in northern Nigeria.

On its parts Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire also use domestic gas resources for power generation, pointing to a landscape in which resource availability is not the constraining factor.

The existence of gas resources and pipelines does not guarantee electricity supply. In Nigeria, gas-fired generation accounts for most of the installed thermal capacity, yet plant availability remains significantly below installed levels. In early 2026, the Nigerian Independent System Operator the authority responsible for the country’s national electricity grid reported that thermal plants were receiving less than half of the gas required to operate at optimal capacity, resulting in unit shutdowns and depressed generation.

As deliveries recovered, power output increased almost immediately. Gas may be available in the ground and increasingly in the pipe, but payment discipline, contractual performance and market liquidity often determine whether it reaches power stations.

However, as demand grows and more gas is required, many competing demand centers, often international, are targeting the same gas molecules. For international oil companies, LNG export projects are usually the preferred route for commercializing gas resources, offering higher netbacks from global LNG prices while also generating foreign exchange and tax revenue for governments. Nigeria’s LNG export sector is expanding rapidly, and several recent upstream developments are being directed toward LNG feedgas requirements, while floating LNG proposals remain under discussion.

This creates a tighter balance among LNG exports, domestic gas demand, gas-to-power development and regional pipeline ambitions.

Where upstream and midstream development lags, LNG imports can provide an alternative pathway. Senegal became sub-Saharan Africa’s first LNG importer in 2025, even as it became an LNG exporter through the Greater Tortue Ahmeyim FLNG project, shared with Mauritania.

Imported LNG supports power generation around Dakar, where domestic gas resources are not yet connected to demand centers by pipeline. Similar approaches could emerge elsewhere in the region, where gas discoveries are distant from population and demand clusters or where projected gas-to-power demand will exceed domestic reserves. Nonetheless, relying on LNG imports exposes buyers to international prices, introducing affordability risks and foreign-currency payment constraints.

The report states that in West Africa, gas infrastructure performs a similar integrating function to cross-border power transmission. Pipelines, LNG import terminals and gas-fired generation allow demand centers to draw on resources beyond their borders, reducing dependence on domestic reserves and imported liquid fuels. They can also create additional outlets for producers, improve project economics and provide the scale needed to support investment. Like the West African Power Pool, they also require common rules on tariffs, transit, taxation and dispute resolution, helping to deepen regional cooperation.

Regional gas integration centers on the 569-kilometer West African Gas Pipeline, which has supplied Nigerian gas to Benin, Togo and Ghana since 2010, underpinning power generation in these countries.

Throughput has continued to increase in 2026 as demand from power generators and industry has grown. However, as with the commercial constraints in Nigeria, the pipeline still operates below full capacity, and utilization has historically been constrained as much by contractual and payment issues as by physical infrastructure.

Ghana provides the clearest example of this evolution. Following the development of Ghana’s offshore gas resources, the West African Gas Pipeline now operates as a bidirectional, open-access system, allowing Ghanaian gas to move eastward while facilitating imports when required. The result is a more flexible regional market in which countries can increasingly act as both suppliers and consumers, depending on production and demand conditions.

Electricity trade adds a second layer to the integration story. It is already central to the supply model of several smaller, more import-dependent West African systems, such as Togo and Benin, while regional data shows that Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Nigeria continue to act as important suppliers to neighboring markets. Interconnections can reduce exposure to domestic generation constraints and support reserve adequacy during tight periods, but traded power must be deliverable as well as contracted. Transmission availability, dispatch coordination and payment discipline will determine whether cross-border flows can be relied on when systems are under stress.

The same long-term integration logic underpins the proposed African Atlantic Gas Pipeline. It would traverse coastal West African countries — Benin, Togo, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, the Republic of Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Gambia, Senegal and Mauritania — before reaching Morocco, with potential links to landlocked markets such as Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. The pipeline is framed as a regional development initiative rather than simply an export route. Linking gas-producing and gas-consuming markets along the Atlantic coast could expand market access, strengthen energy security and support greater integration of West African gas markets.