The Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), the US Government’s development finance institution, has committed over $1.6bn to support President Obama’s Power Africa initiative, thus surpassing its initial financing and insurance goals.

Power Africa, launched in June 2013, is a partnership among more than 100 public and private sector partners to bring new power access to the more than 600 million Sub-Saharan Africans that currently live without electricity.

As a key part of this initiative, OPIC pledged to provide $1.5bn in financing and insurance to private sector energy developers to create new energy solutions across sub-Saharan Africa.

In September of 2015, OPIC surpassed this milestone with the approval of several new projects, and now supports a diverse portfolio of private sector-led development that will create almost 1,500 new megawatts (MWs) of on-grid and off-grid power across Sub-Saharan Africa in support of the Presidential initiative.

Elizabeth Littlefield, OPIC’s President and CEO, said that since Power Africa was announced, OPIC’s catalytic debt finance and political risk insurance has resulted in agency commitments totaling nearly 1,500 new megawatts of electricity using an all-of-the above approach to generation and access.

“This is a major achievement not only for OPIC and Power Africa, but for the millions of Africans benefiting from this initiative. They will now be able to access advantages in education, healthcare, business growth and quality of life that come with increased energy access.”

“In the years ahead, we look forward to further increasing our relationships with US businesses investing in Africa’s promising energy future,” she said.

Projects included in OPIC’s African energy portfolio span the range of responsive, unique approaches that are needed to address Africa’s electricity challenges.

Large grid-connected projects take advantage of Africa’s diverse and abundant resources.

Charles Stadtlander, a spokesman for OPIC, said: “We are firmly committed to Power Africa through support to the US private sector, in all OPIC-eligible countries throughout Sub-Saharan Africa.”

“We finance projects large and small, from thermal and renewable power sources, and both off-grid and on-grid,” he told Africa Global Funds.

For example, in West Africa, OPIC-supported multi-fuel power plants that can run on natural gas or oil include the 204 MW Amandi facility in Ghana and the 53 MW Cap des Biches facility in Senegal.

And to tap into East Africa’s abundant wind potential, OPIC financing will help the Kipeto and Lake Turkana wind power facilities deliver more than 400 MWs of new power to the Kenyan national grid.

Recognizing that the African power solution is greater than just grid delivery, OPIC support will also provide new access to tens of thousands of people living away from large power infrastructures with financing to off-grid home solar kits from Nova-Lumos in Nigeria.

This achievement comes years ahead of schedule for OPIC, and the agency is already on its way to fulfilling a pledge for another $1bn of financing and insurance in support of Power Africa.

“Power Africa makes up just a portion of what OPIC does overall, and we also will continue to support private sector-led, lasting development projects worldwide. This includes sectors like clean water, agriculture, education, healthcare, and SME lending, to name a few,” commented Stadtlander.