This TED Talk features energy scientist Rose Moutizo, recorded live at TED Summit 2019.

So right now, nearly one billion people globally don't have access to electricity in their homes.

And in South China, Africa, more than half of the population remain in the dark.

There's a name for this darkness.

It's called energy poverty, and it has massive implications for economic development and social well-being.

One unique aspect of the energy poverty problem in Sabta and Africa.

And by the way, in this talk, when I say energy, I mean electricity.

One thing that's unique about it is there isn't much legacy infrastructure

already in place in many countries of the region.

So, for example, according to 2015 data,

the total installed electricity capacity in sub-Saharan Africa

is only about 100 gigawatts.

That's similar to that of the UK.

So this actually presents a unique

opportunity to build an energy system in the 21st century, almost from scratch. Question is,

how do you do that? We could look back to the past and replicate the ways in which we've managed to

bring stable, affordable electricity to a big part of the world's population.

But we all know that that has some well-known, terrible side effects,

such as pollution and climate change,

in addition to being costly and inefficient.

With Africa's population set to quadruple by the end of the century,

this is not a theoretical question.

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