The Gambia

Critically Insufficient4°C+ World

NDCs with this rating fall well outside of a country’s “fair share” range and are not at all consistent with holding warming to below 2°C let alone with the Paris Agreement’s stronger 1.5°C limit. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming would exceed 4°C.

Highly insufficient< 4°C World

NDCs with this rating fall outside of a country’s “fair share” range and are not at all consistent with holding warming to below 2°C let alone with the Paris Agreement’s stronger 1.5°C limit. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming would reach between 3°C and 4°C.

Insufficient< 3°C World

NDCs with this rating are in the least stringent part of a country’s “fair share” range and not consistent with holding warming below 2°C let alone with the Paris Agreement’s stronger 1.5°C limit. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming would reach over 2°C and up to 3°C.

2°C Compatible< 2°C World

NDCs with this rating are consistent with the 2009 Copenhagen 2°C goal and therefore fall within a country’s “fair share” range, but are not fully consistent with the Paris Agreement long term temperature goal. If all government NDCs were in this range, warming could be held below, but not well below, 2°C and still be too high to be consistent with the Paris Agreement 1.5°C limit.

1.5°C Paris Agreement Compatible< 1.5°C World

This rating indicates that a government’s NDCs in the most stringent part of its “fair share” range: it is consistent with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit.

Role model<< 1.5°C World

This rating indicates that a government’s NDC is more ambitious than what is considered a “fair” contribution: it is more than consistent with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit.

Economy wide

With currently implemented policies, The Gambia says it expects, through deploying renewable energy, to achieve emissions levels (excluding LULUCF) of 3.75 MtCO2e in 2030 instead of 3.85 MtCO2e in its BAU in 2030. This is equivalent to an increase of around three times above 2000 levels. In 2017, The Gambia published the first volume of its Strategic Programme for Climate Resilience (SPCR), which includes many activities synergetic with NDC targets around afforestation, renewable energy, and energy efficiency measures (Climate Investment Funds 2017). The SPCR summarises the strategy to building a climate-resilient pathway focusing on creating an overarching framework while presenting concrete investment programmes.

In 2012, The Gambian government proposed a list of ten NAMAs to be implemented in the energy, forestry, agriculture and waste sectors (Government of The Gambia 2012a). Most of these are still under development and seek support for implementation (UNFCCC 2018; NAMA Database 2017). Due to this uncertainty, we have not included the proposed NAMAs in the current policy projections. The Gambia has also, in 2018, initiated a project that aims to restore 10,000 hectares of forests, mangroves, and savannas (Green Climate Fund 2018) bringing it closer to reaching its NDC afforestation targets. The Gambia’s NDC unconditional afforestation targets will contribute with emissions reduction of 0.3 MtCO2eq in 2030.

Aside from the government’s projections in its NDC, there are no other recent emissions projections for The Gambia, so the CAT could not refer to independent data sources. The quality of historical data is also poor (see ‘Assumptions’ section).

Energy Supply

To achieve its conditional and unconditional NDC targets, the government also aims to set up a framework for renewable energy development. In 2013, the Gambian Parliament passed the New Renewable Energy law (Government of The Gambia 2013) and tasked the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority with defining and implementing the rules for pricing the feed-in tariff (FiT) for renewable electricity. The new law establishes a renewable energy fund to develop renewable energy infrastructure, capacity building, research and development, local equipment production and promotion.

Between 2013 and 2017, only 0.2 MWp solar and 0.2 MW wind capacity were installed in The Gambia (IRENA 2018) but the first large scale solar PV project (10–20 MWp) received finance for its construction in the Greater Banjul area in May 2018 (The World Bank 2018). This projected would results in emissions reduction of 4.7 ktCO2e/year if it displaced oil-fired power generation. While this is a step in the right direction, it represents around 6% of the renewable energy emissions reduction target. So, we do not include the unconditional targets associated with renewable energy as current policy projections yet.

In 2015, The Gambian government announced a Sustainable Energy Action Plan (Government of The Gambia 2015), including the National Renewable Energy Action Plan (NREAP) and the National Energy Efficiency Action Plan (NEEAP). The NREAP sets targets for renewable energy capacity deployment until 2020 and 2030 as well as the instalment of solar thermal systems. The NEEAP outlines measures to increase energy efficiency until 2030, including the gradual phase-out of incandescent bulbs and the installation of efficient charcoal production technologies.

No recent information is available on the current implementation status of either action plan so we do not include them as the current policy projections. But, while implementation is unclear, the African Development Bank has approved a grant for the development of mini grids in The Gambia through its Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa. This project supports installation of small and medium scale projects and the creation of governance structures to support renewable energy development (ESI Africa 2017).