Our investment in Virunga Energies is bringing renewable electricity to Nord-Kivu, boosting business activity and reducing deforestation.
Rural communities in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) live in extreme poverty. The majority of homes lack electricity. In the Nord-Kivu region, only 3 per cent of people have access to electricity, compared with 17 per cent nationally. Without proper infrastructure, local industry relies on costly diesel or charcoal burned from trees cut down illegally from the Virunga National Park.
Virunga Energies is a hydropower company in the DRC, backed by UK charity Virunga Foundation. Since 2013, it has supplied clean electricity to communities and infrastructure around the park. Between 2016 and 2022, we invested $19.3 million to expand its existing grid and build two new generation assets to supply electricity to households and SMEs in the region.
In 2024, we invested a further $3.5 million to help Virunga build new high-voltage substations. These are key to enabling the transmission of electricity from the new Rwanguba power plant to Goma, cutting energy waste and improving power quality in the region.
In 2024, we also published an evaluation which found Virunga Energies had successfully added over 25,000 new connections to the mini-grid, more than double its initial target when we invested. These include connections to many underserved communities that are likely to have had electricity for the first time.
